This comes down to the myth of "us" vs. "them".

I guess it was my mother that taught me to perform substitutions on the fly when reading or listening...

Here are the substitutions I used on the Senator's speech:

    "American worker" --> "worker"
    "guest worker" --> "worker"
    "single mom" --> "foreign single mom"

OK, that last one was just for my own amusement! :)

Once those substitutions (and all conceptually similar substitutions) are done, the speech doesn't make sense.

Since I always perform the substitutions, since I have done so since I was a child... nobody's anti-immigrant spew has ever made sense to me!

For what it is worth, I'm white and male. I guess my mother was a bit of an oddball, though.

I have found it very difficult to interact with people that see the world as 'us' vs. 'them'. Any advice?

[NB I started skimming the Senator's speech halfway through. Not a lot of new material in there.]