Mexico
(North America)

In the 1930s, Mexico had to deal with an influx of people deported from the United States. This was known as the "Mexican Repatriation." At the same time, the country began to tighten its own immigration policies. It followed the model of the United States, discriminating based on races and ethnicities considered "undesirable." Jews were especially unwanted.

Work Permits and Citizenship in South American Countries - Mexico
1938 memorandum on "Work Permits and Citizenship in South American Countries." This section on Mexico discusses restrictions, including special permits needed for immigrants.

"Mexican Repatriation"

During this decade, Mexico was dealing with the "Mexican Repatriation." Up to 1,800,000, Mexican and Mexican-Americans were deported to Mexico by the United States government. Approximately 60% of those deported were citizens of the United States by birth. Such deportations were based on Mexicans supposedly "stealing jobs" from "real Americans," in other words, the white population. This started when the Los Angeles Welfare Department decided to begin deporting hospital patients of Mexican descent. One of them was a woman with leprosy who was driven just over the border and left in Mexicali, Mexico. Others deported hospital patients had tuberculosis, paralysis, mental illness- or problems related to old age. None of that mattered. They were deported anyway.

Immigration

In 1933, Mexico began to tighten its own immigration policies. Like the United States immigration act of 1924, Mexico began to discriminate against immigrants based on race and ethnicity. Those considered to be "undesirable" included Poles, Lithuanians, and Czechoslovakians. For political reasons, citizens of the Soviet Union were also barred.

Jews were especially undesirable. Mexico seemed to blame the Jewish population for "intending to take over businesses."

Policies and sentiments in Mexico began to change when a more radical government came into power in 1934 with Lazaro Cardenas as its head. Under Cardenas, Mexico was the only country at the League of Nations to condemn Adolf Hitler’s annexation of Austria. However, even with more sympathetic feelings toward Jewish refugees, very few were admitted because immigration numbers decreased and very few ships made their way from Europe between 1938 and 1940.