The China Lobby was hardly the only force behind the Second Red Scare. Nor was Nixon its only progenitor. But Tricky Dick has a better claim to the title than Joe McCarthy, who didn’t step into the spotlight until 1950, two years after Nixon sponsored legislation to require “individuals who knowingly and willfully participate in the world communist movement” to register with the attorney general, and thus to face criminal sanctions. To head off these measures—but also in service of its own ends—the Truman administration implemented a suite of repressive measures, including the deportation of immigrant radicals. As Richard Freeland writes in his classic account, “aliens who were active in opposition to Cold War foreign policy . . . were arrested and held without bail on Ellis Island.” For example:
Ferdinand Smith was picked up twenty-four hours after he shared a speakers’ platform with Henry Wallace and while en route to a meeting of the National Maritime Union at which endorsement of the Marshall Plan was the main item on the agenda.
Tom Clark, Truman’s attorney general, was
completely candid that his use of the legally dubious practice, [which] was disallowed by a federal court in March 1948, was intended to prevent the detained individuals from continuing their political activities. [As Clark said,] “I ordered Mr. Eisler picked up because he had been making speeches around the country that were derogatory to our way of life.”
These deportations, Freeland writes
were a clear warning to all unnaturalized aliens…that active opposition to Cold War foreign policy could subject diem to severe penalties. They also suggested to native Americans that opposition to the Administration’s policies was an alien concept, to be associated with deportable criminals.
You might now be thinking about Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia student activist who was kidnapped by ICE on March 8, in a Columbia owned building, in front of his wife, who is eight months pregnant. Khalil, a green card holder, is a lawful permanent resident of the US. Secretary of State Marco Rubio personally ordered the deportation, on the basis that Khalil’s “presence or activities in the United States would have serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.” He has not been charged with any crime; the Trump gang accuses him not of “aiding” but of “siding with terrorists.” I suspect large segments of Rubio’s political base in Miami could be accused of the same. As of this writing, we finally know where Khalil is being held (Louisiana). He has not been allowed to speak privately with his lawyers.