“None of These People Are from the Border”: A Dispatch from the National Defense Area in New Mexico

All the militarization and its propaganda hide a real border security issue: the struggle people face in making ends meet.

A Stryker combat vehicle and soldiers at the New Mexico border on May 8. (Photo by Can Hasasu/Anadolu via Getty Images)

When I asked Norma Gomez, program organizer for the Chamber of Commerce in Columbus, New Mexico, about the National Defense Area announced on April 11 by the Trump administration, she was busy trying to secure two weeks of back pay for …