ABSTRACT
O November 1994 California voters passed Proposition 187, which, if implemented, will deny public school education, health care, and other public benefits to undocumented immigrants and their children. I believe that the rhetoric animating support for this proposition reflects a distinctive shift from anti-immigrant hysteria of recent decades, approximated perhaps only by the allegations targeting Mexicans and Mexican Americans during the Great Depression. Unlike the xenophobia of recent decades, the current rhetoric focuses on public resource usage and targets immigrant women, relying on both racist and misogynist imagery.
