Learning Takeaways — Unpacking the Beast That is Immigration in America
On Friday, July 18, the Association of Foreign Press Correspondents in the United States (AFPC) recorded a podcast episode that focused on immigration and immigration laws in the US.
The interview was conducted by Ankita M. Kumar, a documentary filmmaker and international journalist. She spoke with Cecilia Menjívar, distinguished professor of Sociology at UCLA and the Dorothy L. Meier Chair in social equities and Hiroshi Motomura, the Susan Westerberg Preger distinguished Professor of Law at UCLA's Law School.
AFPC-USA is solely responsible for the content of this podcast episode. The link to the podcast transcript for this episode can be found HERE.
Kumar started off by asking Motomura and Menjívar about the recent protests in LA and why they escalated. Last month, protests began in the city of Los Angeles, after immigration and customs enforcement agents raided several locations in LA to arrest individuals believed to be staying illegally in the United States. Things escalated quickly as the National Guard, followed by 700 Marines, were deployed in LA. On June 8, thousands of protesters took to the streets to protest President Trump's deployment of the guard, blocking a major freeway as law enforcement used tear gas, rubber bullets, and flashbangs to control the crowd
Motomura put the LA protests into a political context and explained that to raise the number of deportations, the federal government has to enlist the help of both the state and local police. However, the fact that LA is a ‘sanctuary city’ and has sanctuary policies impedes this but also makes it a natural target. Rising deportations will also instill a natural fear in people that if the federal government doesn’t arrest them, then the local police will, and they will eventually leave the US because they are scared. LA has a large immigrant population as well, so from a strategy point of view, targeting LA made sense.
Menjívar put things in a historical context and explained that there was always a seeming contradiction in the US regarding immigration and there has always been an attempt to narrow the path of immigration for certain immigrant groups, compared to others. Over the course of the last few years, there have been efforts to exclude, deport and make things a little more difficult for immigrants to live here. Immigration may have ‘looked’ easier in the 80s and 90s, but there were still many laws in place that guided people in different pathways that had exclusionary laws impeding certain groups to migrate as easily as others. Menjívar outlined that historically the US has had laws that exclude specifically on race, such as the Chinese Exclusion Act at the end of the 19th century. While race is not explicitly mentioned in immigration law, that has been another current that has contributed to excluding immigrants.
Motomura added some more historical data points when immigrants from different backgrounds were targeted in the US. He gave the example of immigration restrictions on Catholics and Benjamin Franklin rallying against the adoption of German as the official language of the US. He explained that animosity towards immigration is a cyclical issue. The nostalgia about the good old days of immigration didn't necessarily seem so uncontentious back when they actually happened. Kumar then brought up the need to understand the basics of immigration in the US and veered the discussion towards certain immigration terms prevalent in news today. She gave the example of an immigrant from Honduras who reaches the US-Mexico border and asked Motomura what the next steps would be for an immigrant in this situation.
Motomura explained that there are four streams of lawful immigration in the US, to stay permanently and become a lawful permanent resident. You can come based on work or you can come based on family. There’s also a lottery for a small number of people to get into the country. Then there are people given humanitarian protection as refugees and asylum seekers. He went on to explain different pathways for the scenario Kumar described. An immigrant from Honduras could get a green card right away by marrying an American citizen. Or maybe they can enter on a work visa under a work category. Or maybe they can be recognized or seek to be recognized as someone who gets asylum.
He went on to explain that apart from these pathways there are also ‘temporary’ statuses. One could enter the US as a student, as a business person, or a temporary worker. These people do have a right to work in the US. But if you come temporarily, then the right to work is confined to the job that sponsored you. There are multiple categories to work in the US, but not every pathway leads to permanent residency. There are also historically people who have come to the US without papers, but they don’t have the right to work or a clear pathway to citizenship. He added that a fact that’s often overlooked is that many people in the country without papers came here legally to start with, but they may have overstayed a tourist visa or student visa or some other status they had at the beginning.
Kumar followed up by asking if those who are undocumented can have a clear pathway to citizenship. She gave the example of Afghanistan and Afghans who are in the US on temporary statuses but may not leave after losing their status, as they don’t have a stable country to go back to. Motomura explained that there are some other pathways, such as durable asylum. But just because you qualify doesn't mean you can actually get the status because the procedural hoops you have to run through or jump through to get status – even if you're married to a US citizen, are actually significant. And some of those obstacles Congress put in the way is to make it more difficult to essentially get the green card.
Menjívar then went on to explain what a temporary protected status (TPS) is and how those on a temporary status don’t have the same rights as citizens or permanent residents. She explained that there are a few characteristics of the status that are invisible or completely ignored. TPS was part of the Immigration Naturalization Act of 1990, but no one really knew about it till the first Trump term, when there were efforts to end TPS for people who were on TPS at the time. That's when people started to notice that there was this status – temporary protected status that is not exactly asylum, but somewhere in between. TPS provides protection for 18 months at a time and people have to renew it by paying a fee of $500. Each renewal is announced about two months before the renewal period. The benefits it provides is a work permit and the protection from deportation provided that the person has a clean criminal record.
She went on to further explain that people misunderstand that those who apply for TPS have to not be present in the United States at the time of application. People cannot come into the US with TPS as it’s not a visa. Once people are here, they can apply for TPS if they are eligible. Conditions for TPS have to be certified by the State Department as TPS is not just extended to anyone. It is extended to people who cannot return to a country under civil conflict, political conflict, or a human made or a natural disaster, and where the governments of those countries cannot protect people who may be returned. The idea is to provide temporary protection until those conditions have improved so that people can return. TPS requirements are very specific and it does not provide a pathway to citizenship or lawful permanent residency. But there is a court in the US that recognizes entry and recognizes TPS holders to apply for permanent residency if they have a family member to petition for them. But it’s very limited and it’s not in the law and not allowed as a blank benefit of the status.
With that context, Kumar proceeded to ask the difference between TPS and asylum. Menjívar explained that TPS is temporary, while asylum leads to permanent status. Asylum seekers don’t have to go through the extension process TPS holders go through. Motomura added that the decision making on asylum is done on a family or individual basis, but one needs a lawyer. Also, it’s complicated to show that you qualify. In contrast, TPS is granted on a country by country basis to people who are typically already in the country when the country is designated. Lawyers play an essential role in the process. Some of the people who don’t get asylum may have weak cases, but some of them have good cases and can’t find a lawyer.
With this context established, Motomura and Menjívar explained the meaning of sanctuary. Motomura personally doesn’t like the term ‘sanctuary’, but he calls it an interesting term that’s used by both sides of the debate. Sanctuary laws are at its core laws that limit cooperation by state and local governments, with federal government enforcement. One of the reasons that has motivated sanctuary laws is to limit state and local enforcement. This isn't necessarily just a move against enforcement. Every dollar that Los Angeles devotes to immigration enforcement – is a dollar that's not available for fighting forest fires, for example. Sanctuary is really a way of recognizing people more broadly. People have limited interaction with local police and get offered driver’s licenses, in-state tuition and professional licensing regardless of immigration status. These can be defined as inclusion provisions. What motivates these policies and unifies them is to recognize people as community members regardless of status.
He concludes that we have a system where the formal rules to come to this country legally don't match up with the jobs that people can get and with the families that people live in. The end result is that we have a lot of “in-between statuses”. Motomura says the system technically invites people to work, recognizes them in the community, gives them drivers licenses and other things so that they can get to work. In that context, sanctuary is part of curtailing enforcement or containing local dollars for enforcement. But it's also part of recognizing the role that people who are non-citizens, regardless of immigration status, play in families and businesses in the community.
Kumar and Motomura also touched upon the overarching ability of the federal government to override the state infrastructure. Motomura outlined that the US Constitution puts a lot of limits on federal enforcement. There are laws requiring warrants and reasonable suspicion of legal violations before the federal government can arrest people. There are also practical limitations. One practical limitation is just human resources or police power to have local police involved in this. This is one of the reasons why President Trump basically called upon the National Guard and then the Marines in LA. He also emphasized that there’s now an outcry that is being reflected in recent polls, with people saying, I didn’t sign up for mass deportations. If mass deportations mean arresting people on the basis of their appearance, it could mean this includes US citizens as well. So limitations are federal, constitutional and they have to do with limited state and local cooperation.
The discussion then veered towards deportations and the criteria for deporting a person. Motomura said there need to be grounds for deportations. For example, a permanent resident could be deported if they have committed crimes of a certain seriousness. If a person has overstayed or violated the terms of a temporary permission to enter, they could be deported. The third type of ground for deportation is for people who are in the country, essentially, unlawfully without lawful status. One sub-category of this could be people who overstayed – came in legally, but stayed illegally. The other possibility is people who came across the border and evaded the border patrol or came across the border with false papers. But one can also get deported, unfortunately, for the way they look. There are some real concerns in this administration of people being deported without being given a chance to explain themselves. This is why people are carrying passports around because they're afraid that they might look to somebody in the federal government that they're not here legally. He gave an example of a situation where Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was not a US citizen, but had his case working through the courts, deported to El Salvador by mistake. Unfortunately, one of the ways to increase the numbers of people being deported is to basically have speed deportation. That means you’re going to get a lot of people caught up in the machinery without giving them a chance to prevent them being sent to the CECOT prison in El Salvador and other places. One of the ways that you up the numbers of deportation is you don't give people a chance to explain why they shouldn't be deported under the law of the United States.
Kumar asked the panelists how migrants who have traversed dangerous conditions, like the Darién Gap in South America, rebuilt their lives in the US. Menjívar said that it’s not just the Gap, but there are other dangerous territories too that immigrants have to traverse to enter the US. Central American immigrants from Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras have been traveling through Mexico in extremely dangerous situations since the 1980s and continue to do so. In her book, Menjívar details some of the journeys immigrants undertake, particularly through Mexico. According to her, Salvadorans and Guatemalans have been going through a test of fire and have found it extremely difficult to settle in the United States because they have never been allowed or never been recognized as needing protection. Undertaking dangerous journeys, not being recognized as refugees or granted asylum – all these affect immigrants’ lives.
She believes different people and age groups have different experiences of immigration and these experiences can’t be clubbed together in the same umbrella. Men go through very difficult circumstances when they arrive in the US, especially if they don't have legal protection and don't have access to decent paid jobs. The same applies to women. There are some particularities for each different social position. For instance, women have the added layer of being more likely to be exposed to different forms of violence during the journey, but also when they arrive. It is a specific aspect of how they experience the journey and their adaptation here. Children and youth, because of their age and because of their position within their families have different experiences. They have to attend schools at the same time and they have these adult size situations that they have to deal with within their families like not having documents, living in cramped apartments, etc.
The conversation now veered towards an immigration program for children – the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). Menjívar explained that DACA is a memo that was drafted during the Obama administration in 2012 to protect minors who were brought to the country as children, from deportation, and to provide them a work permit. It’s weaker compared to the TPS, as TPS is in the law. It is up to the current administration whether they want to continue with the DACA program that looks on the face of it very similar to temporary status. People have to renew every two years, pay a fee, and show that they're good citizens. While on the face of it looks similar, people on DACA have no path to citizenship. It's even weaker in terms of the legal protection and legal standing compared to TPS. The other aspect of DACA that makes it even more difficult to apply for is that people have had to have continued residence in the United States since June 2007 and to have been present in the United States since June 15, 2012. This is a date that has not changed. There are many people who are never going to be protected by DACA because there is this date in the executive order that was passed. Those who were able to be protected by DACA when it came out and when they applied and who were here by June 15, 2012 – they are the ones who may be at risk of losing their limited protection. DACA allows them to go to school and to get better jobs. But again, it does not allow the same rights as citizens. It does not allow them to vote. It doesn't allow them to conduct themselves as a permanent lawful resident either. But it's an important form of protection. Motomura added that there have been no new grants of DACA since 2010 because of a court order. This court order was recently limited to people in the state of Texas. Under the current administration, there has been tremendous reluctance to apply for DACA as it’s not clear if the person will get it. According to Hiroshi, DACA has been fading away because of the residency requirement.
The panelists next addressed the growing misinformation around immigration and immigration laws in the US. According to Menjívar, it’s easy to blame social problems on immigrants as they are the ‘low hanging fruit’ of society. US citizens face a lot of inequality in their daily lives that can easily be blamed on immigrants. Immigrants are like a scapegoat to explain to poor working class US citizens that if we get rid of these people, their lives will be so much better, when in fact it may not be the case at all. Motomura added that the current president’s political messaging is also built around this narrative. He explained that social media and people living in their own news bubbles or universes is also one of the contributing factors of people’s hate towards immigration.
The framing of immigrants as criminals also helps the political narrative, because no one wants criminals in their country. This is sold to the American public as – we are going to get rid of criminals – when in fact, the only thing these people may have done is to be in the country without documents.
Kumar then brought up legal immigration. She asked why legal immigrants were included in the proposal ending birthright citizenship. Motomura explained that the birthright citizenship proposals sort of reflect the current administration’s mindset about going back to 1965 – when there were few immigrants and immigration was based on race and racial discrimination. He believes a lot of what's driving this administration is the vision of nostalgia for a certain type of America. There's a non-recognition of the fact that many international students ultimately get permanent jobs and many become citizens and many are the founders of very important companies in the United States. But there's a real reluctance and even an opposition to accepting them really as Americans.
Kumar also brought confusing messaging around the H1B visa for skilled workers. While some people like Elon Musk advocate for it, others see it as a tool to take away jobs from American workers. Motomura explained that while there have been some cases of H1B workers taking away jobs from Americans, or the job going overseas, it’s a misleading way to think about this from the policy point of view and to what the system should be like because there’s not a one-for-one correspondence between an H1B holder and people who had the job before. Motomura believes that H1B holders help businesses grow, create jobs, reinvest profits and become a more prosperous growing concern over a period of 5 - 20 years. There may be short-term focus displacement, but the long-term prosperity that immigration brings has really been essential to American economic growth. But we need to find better ways to make sure that the growth of companies spurred by H1B workers is a prosperity that is shared. Instead of saying no H1B workers, we should invest more in training programs.
On the topic of the F1 visa for students, Motomura said that the current administration has done a lot of things that have injured or disadvantaged American education, particularly, higher education. The US Department of State is now issuing less F1 visas and there’s more scrutiny on these visas. The administration has made it more difficult to come to the US as an international student. One example is the current administration going after Harvard's ability to admit international students, but there are other instances that are more subtle, but very real issues. There was a pause on interviews at consulates to even get visas and then a resumption that involved a promise of more vetting of social media. This will eventually cause damage to the American economy and have ripple effects on the business community and employers. International students participate in education, they pay tuition, which helps keep American education afloat, but they also provide a supply of talent. In fact, many people who come to study in this country but don't stay back, often have a lifelong loyalty to the United States and have real good memories of their time here.
To this, Menjívar pointed out that most H1B workers are trained in other countries and US companies employ their talent without investing in their training. So it is a win-win for the US economy and for employers across sectors, but specifically in certain sectors.
To close, Kumar asked about the future of immigration in the US. Menjívar pointed to a broader historical trend - that immigration experiences a cyclical up and down trend. We will continue to see migration as the US needs people and the birth rate is falling. We need workers, people who consume, pay taxes, etc., to keep the country alive. There will probably be a reorganization and there will be new laws in place. But we need to wait and see what shape the laws will take. Motomura pointed out that we are now reaching a stage of a fall in asylum and legal immigration. We will have to go through a period of hurt which may take some time to really get into American public perception. People could get affected in a myriad of ways, for example, American citizens could not have enough faculty and teaching assistants at universities. Motomura emphasized that going forward, there should be more of a recognition that the American immigration system is not working and we should figure out what exactly the problem is. We are still trying to figure out who is going to be in the growing economy, but we just don’t have a legal system that provides that.
Motomura explained that it's been very difficult for politicians and policy makers and even the American public to have the patience to fix things. But the mess we are in has been many years in the making. The idea of a “quick fix” is elusive and deceptive. But the legal immigration system has to get fixed and people have to be legalized. But it’s something we have to look at in the coming generation. It certainly won’t happen in the next election cycle.
