Ruben Navarrette: Why ‘illegal’ immigrant is the right term

SAN DIEGO — Now that it has dropped the term “illegal immigrant” from its stylebook, The Associated Press should admit its mistake and print a correction.

This change isn’t about journalism. It’s about political correctness.

Even the official explanation, by AP Executive Editor Kathleen Carroll, is incomprehensible. In a blog post, Carroll wrote:

“The Stylebook no longer sanctions the term ‘illegal immigrant’ or the use of ‘illegal’ to describe a person. Instead, it tells users that ‘illegal’ should describe only an action, such as living in or immigrating to a country illegally.”

Carroll’s explanation is as convoluted as they come. It mixes together nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs. You can say someone immigrated illegally but you can’t call him an illegal immigrant? That makes no sense.

Just a few months ago, the AP was in the opposite camp. When activists pressured it to dump what they call the “I-word,” the news agency showed some spine and refused.

That’s what journalists are supposed to do. It’s not our job to play the role of defense attorneys who want to lessen the offenses their clients are charged with. That’s what this campaign is really about — slowly convincing Americans that the estimated 11 million people who are in the United States without proper documents did nothing wrong, have nothing for which to apologize or make amends, and should just be left alone.

Of course, the activists don’t want Congress to leave the undocumented alone. They want lawmakers to grant them legal status, on the condition that illegal immigrants will do whatever is necessary to right the wrong that, the activists insist, they never committed.

Besides, this whole debate over the “I-word” is a distraction from issues that really matter. It puts a bright light on the hypocrisy of liberals who are tough on words but soft on an administration that has been like a plague set loose on Latino immigrants in the United States.

Here’s some recent news that immigrant advocates might have missed while crusading against the “I-word”:

Citing budget constraints, Immigration and Customs Enforcement released 2,228 incarcerated individuals characterized as “low-risk, noncriminal detainees.” These are precisely the kind of people that President Barack Obama and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano have repeatedly said would not be detained, but there they are.

U.S. Border Patrol agents in the Buffalo, N.Y., office have, in recent years, been rewarded with cash bonuses and gift cards as part of a quota system. According to a report, the program — is part of an agency culture that “maximizes arrest rates.” The result: ethnic profiling of Hispanics.

The American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina obtained emails showing that ICE officials have developed strategies to boost deportation figures. During each year of the Obama administration, about 400,000 illegal immigrants have been deported. The emails show that immigrants convicted of minor crimes or no crimes at all are also targeted. The result: more profiling.

By the end of 2013, a staggering 2 million illegal immigrants will have been rounded up and deported by officials. We’re talking about hundreds of thousands of broken homes, divided families, and children raised without parents.

How about we make a deal? The Obama administration brings back everyone it deported by hook or by crook. And, when these people get here, you can call them whatever you want.

Ruben Navarrette is a syndicated columnist.