"Rebel historian" Kelly Lytle Hernández reframes our understanding of U.S. history in this groundbreaking narrative of revolution in the borderlands. Bad Mexicans tells the dramatic story of the magonistas, the migrant rebels who sparked the 1910 Mexican Revolution from the United States. Led by a brilliant but ill-tempered radical named Ricardo Flores Magón, the magonistas were a motley band of journalists, miners, migrant workers, and more, who organized thousands of Mexican workers--and American dissidents--to their cause. Determined to oust Mexico's dictator, Porfirio Díaz, who encouraged the plunder of his country by U.S. imperialists such as Guggenheim and Rockefeller, the rebels had to outrun and outsmart the swarm of U. S. authorities vested in protecting the Diaz regime. The U.S. Departments of War, State, Treasury, and Justice as well as police, sheriffs, and spies, hunted the magonistas across the country. Capturing Ricardo Flores Magón was one of the FBI's first cases. But the magonistas persevered. They lived in hiding, wrote in secret code, and launched armed raids into Mexico until they ignited the world's first social revolution of the twentieth century. Taking readers to the frontlines of the magonista uprising and the counterinsurgency campaign that failed to stop them, Kelly Lytle Hernández puts the magonista revolt at the heart of U.S. history. Long ignored by textbooks, the magonistas threatened to undo the rise of Anglo-American power, on both sides of the border, and inspired a revolution that gave birth to the Mexican-American population, making the magonistas' story integral to modern American life."-- Provided by publisher.

tIntroduction.We stand between -- Part 1. El Porfiriato -- Chapter 1. If we're not careful -- Chapter 2. Order and progress -- Chapter 3. Den of thieves -- Chapter 4. We won't be silenced -- Chapter 5. The Constitution is dead -- Part 2. We will be revolutionaries -- Chapter 6. The Brown Belt -- Chapter 7. Send the secret police -- Chapter 8. We return to the fight -- Chapter 9. What I believe -- Chapter 10. Cananea -- Chapter 11. No alarm in Mexico -- Chapter 12. Send five dollars for the machine -- Chapter 13. The Jiménez Raid -- Part 3. Running down the revolutionists -- Chapter 14. Something unusual -- Chapter 15. The death of Juan José Arredondo -- Chapter 16. The dead letter office -- Chapter 17. We knew his whereabouts continuously -- Chapter 18. The kidnapping of Manuel Sarabia -- Chapter 19. El alma de todo -- Chapter 20. The United States vs. Ricardo Flores Magón -- Part 4. ¡Tierra y libertad! -- Chapter 21. The people's cause -- Chapter 22. An attempt to precipitate a general disturbance -- Chapter 23. The Bureau of Investigation -- Chapter 24. A tremendous shock to the American people -- Chapter 25. The revolution begins -- Conclusion. Always a rebel -- Appendix. Rebel pseudonyms and code names.