“It Be Your Own People Sometimes”: Mestizaje, Color-Blindness, and Republican Partisanship Among Mexican Immigrants

Abstract

How do racial ideologies influence how Mexican immigrants think about race, racism, and inequality once in the U.S. and what are the political implications? To answer these questions, I employ a historical and comparative approach to provide an ideological framework to understand the relationship between Mexican immigrants’ racial viewpoints and Republican partisanship. I focus on two dominant racial ideologies that I assert are opposite sides of the same coin: mestizaje in Mexico and color blindness in the U.S. Overall, this dissertation makes three core arguments. First, despite differences in the history of race and racism in both countries, both mestizaje in Mexico and colorblindness in the United States provide an ideological roadmap to rationalize away racial inequalities and racism. Second, as migrants motivated by the American Dream to immigrate and coming from a context where there is little to no perceived discourse around race and racism, Mexicans are predisposed to being receptive to color-blind messages in the U.S. Third, despite the Republican Party and Donald Trump being associated with tough immigration policies and anti-immigrant attitudes, Mexicans who embrace color-blindness may view support for the party and Trump as unproblematic. Anchoring these three arguments is my mestizo color-blind theory which posits that Mexicans uphold mestizaje and color-blind ideological frames when they believe there are social, economic, and/or psychological incentives to do so. To advance our knowledge on how racial ideologies come to shape and influence Mexican’s understanding of race, racism, and racial inequalities and its association with Mexican Republican partisanship and views of Trump, I conduct a multi-method research project. I conducted semi-structured one-on-one interviews with Mexican immigrants in Durham, NC and Philadelphia, PA. Through an inductive approach to my interviews, I illustrate how both racial ideologies are prevalent in Mexican immigrant racial discourse. Additionally, I conduct regression analysis using the 2020 Collaborative Multiracial Post-Election Survey (CMPS) to assess the relationship between Mexicans’ responses to color-blind questions and both Mexican partisanship and views of Donald Trump. The interview findings revealed roughly four broad categories that Mexican immigrants fall into while navigating mestizaje and color blindness: 1) Mexicans who internalize mestizaje in Mexico but challenge colorblind frames in the U.S. 2) Mexicans who internalize both mestizaje and color-blindness. 3) Mexicans who challenge mestizaje in Mexico but internalize color-blind frames in the U.S. 4) Mexicans who challenge both mestizaje and color-blindness. The quantitative analysis using CMPS data produced mixed results. Of the three color-blind variables I used to assess their association with Republican partisanship and views of Trump among Mexican immigrants, two measures produced statistically significant, positive results with Republican partisanship and having a favorable view of Trump, respectively. Ultimately, my findings suggest that Mexican immigrants are influenced by both mestizaje and color-blind racial ideologies and that they can have a relationship with Mexican immigrant politics in the U.S.