Late this April, in an old factory complex converted into swank suburban shopping digs in the Nashville suburb of Franklin, more than 1,000 Tennesseans came out to cheer their hero, 99.7-FM drive-home-time host Phil Valentine. The son of a former Democratic Congressman in North Carolina, Valentine is a leading voice--and instigator--of Tennessee's nativist backlash. "Wake up and smell the tacos," Valentine likes to say, flaunting his political incorrectness. His website recently featured a full-color image of the Statue of Liberty wearing a sombrero, with a huge black mustache pasted on, a jar of salsa instead of a flame and a bottle of Patron cradled in her lower hand. Liberty rests on a tottering foundation of Chicklets, Tostitos and a Taco Bell sign.

All in all, a lot like the "joke" that slipped out of Valentine's mouth at his rally in Franklin, where three Republican state legislators joined him on stage. Susan Tully, field director of FAIR (the Washington-based Federation for American Immigration Reform), was complaining about the Border Patrol's "catch and release" policy, saying that illegal immigrants were returned the first time they were caught, the second time, the third time...all the way to seven times. And what, Tully asked rhetorically, do we do the eighth time? "Shoot 'em!" Valentine interjected. The surburbanites roared their approval.

Two months later, in his nondescript studio on Music Circle, I ask about his incendiary comment. "I just said that as an ice-breaker and as a joke," he says. "I am not a racist. I'm not advocating seriously that we shoot anybody. It's just the frustration level."

The frustration level among Tennessee nativists began to reach fever pitch this spring. On March 29 more than 10,000 Hispanic immigrants marched in the largest protest in Nashville history; there were smaller but impressive marches in several other towns and cities across the state. Then came the "Day Without Immigrants" boycott on May 1, when an estimated 10,000 Hispanics in Tennessee took part. Valentine organized a counterboycott with Theresa Harmon's group, TRIP, targeting businesses that shut down for the day. "I've talked to people who said that before the protests they were sitting on the sidelines," Valentine says, "but now they are incensed. They see that these people are carrying Mexican flags, they don't speak English--they are in your face. People are more attuned to what the problem is."

Valentine's show dishes up a full menu of problems: immigrant diseases, "terrorist gangs" and, of course, illegal killers. "If these people were to get vetted like everybody else, we would get rid of the Gustavo Garcia Reyeses before they come over the border," he says. "That particular case has really put a face on the immigration debate like nothing else." That's partly because of Valentine's efforts. The murder in Mount Juliet gave him a perfect opportunity to alert his listeners to a purported wave of violent crime committed by illegal immigrants in Tennessee and nationwide. "I have heard that from thirteen to twenty-five people a day are being killed by illegal immigrants," he tells me. (He's a little sketchy on the source.)

But does Valentine believe the biggest nativist myth of all, that there's a reconquista afoot? "Oh, absolutely," he says. "Not with all of them, but with many of them. I think there's a plan to move Hispanics into the Southwest and vote it back to Mexico. I think there's a big plan to do that. They think that the territory was taken illegally from them in the Mexican-American War. That's where this reconquista thing comes from. They are nuts. This is the United States of America. We can't change that!"

Nor should we have to, Valentine says. "A lot of these people who are illegal want to come and plant their culture inside of ours," he says. "We're having to, now, speak Spanish, and try to understand them. We've never had to understand anybody."

• « Previous
• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4
• 5
• 6
• Next »

• Get The Nation at home (and online!) for 75 cents a week!
• If you like this article, consider making a donation to The Nation.