Writer, Activist
https://apple.news/AiY6v3tN0SU6ES08RMUe29g
Natascha Uhlmann writes in Teen Vogue:
This op-ed argues that the terms we use to discuss immigration rely on a lot of anti-immigrant assumptions.
The United States has a long history of hostility toward immigrants, from barring “undesirables” (a shifting category that has targeted the nonwhite, the disabled, and women) to turning away desperate asylum seekers who went on to gruesome deaths. Even after these cruel laws have been rolled back (and some haven’t), they’ve fundamentally shaped the way we as a nation think of immigration. A lot of the modern policy we consider “common sense” was directly molded by this history. It means that often the terms of the immigration debate rely on a lot of anti-immigrant assumptions. Even the best-intentioned progressives can fall into these traps, which is why examining how we talk about these issues is so important.
THE NOTION THAT THERE ARE “GOOD” AND “BAD” IMMIGRANTS
One common talking point holds that we should welcome the “good” immigrants while getting rid of the “bad” or “criminal” ones. This framing obscures the realities of the U.S. justice system, which disproportionately arrests, convicts, and incarcerates people of color. Black immigrants make up just 7.2% of the noncitizen population, yet they make up over 20% of people facing deportation on criminal grounds. The “good” vs. “bad” framework also obscures how laws are an expression of class power: Financial crimes committed by wealthy individuals and corporations often go unpunished, while everyday people are often punished for their poverty. And even people convicted of crimes shouldn’t lose their humanity, especially in a system that is incentivized to incarcerate.
Anti-immigration advocates often invoke misleading language and statistics suggesting that immigrants commit more crime, while ignoring a vast legal framework set out to criminalize immigrants for minor infractions. Many studies have found that undocumented immigrants actually commit crimes at lower rates than native-born Americans, but our very definition of what constitutes a crime has grown dramatically over the past few decades. A set of 1996 laws expanded deportable offenses by reclassifying more minor crimes as “aggravated felonies” in the context of immigration. As a result, immigrants can be considered felons for acts like drug possession or failing to appear in court.
DISTINGUISHING “REAL” REFUGEES FROM ECONOMIC MIGRANTS
Another dangerous misconception is the differentiation between “real” refugees (people whose search for safety we consider valid) and “economic migrants,” who are perceived as “gaming the system” to obtain a higher standard of living in America. This is a fundamentally false dichotomy: People, and the systems we live in, are far too complex to fit in these binaries. Who gets to be considered a “real” refugee is significantly informed by America’s ideological attitudes; for decades, the system was based more on Cold War politics than any real concern for the safety of asylum seekers. Those fleeing political or religious persecution are seen as legitimate, while those fleeing violent crime or a lack of economic opportunity — causes that also have political roots — are, too often, not. It’s a pattern that continues today: People coming to the U.S. from countries where America has vested geopolitical interests have historically had a harder time gaining asylum than those from countries the U.S. ideologically opposes, even if they have strong claims of persecution.
This hierarchy has stark consequences. As the bar becomes ever higher for who is a “true” refugee, many who flee certain death are turned away. Meanwhile, those who flee “less serious” violence, like poverty and starvation, often have no avenue for help. Their experiences expose the glaring gaps in our asylum policy. Why should certain types of violence be taken more seriously than others? Who is to say that the fear of gang violence is worse than that of not being able to feed your children?
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Read the rest of the op-ed at the link.
Whether you accept Uhlmann’s conclusions or not, her point that immigrants’ advocates often accept the terms and framework set forth by nativists and restrictionists is basically valid. One false concept that appears to govern much of the debate is that immigration is fundamentally “negative” and therefore 1) must be limited to those who can provide immediate economic benefits to us (leaving aside the range of human interests of the immigrants themselves), and 2) that any increases in “desirable” immigration must be offset by cuts, restrictions, and/or removals of “undesirables.”
In many ways, this explains the sad failure of the Obama Administration to adopt more humane and effective immigration policies. They apparently never could get over the idea that they had to “prove their toughness” by deporting record numbers of folks and inflicting some gratuitous cruelty on migrants, particularly helpless asylum seekers, to “establish their creds” and get the GOP to the table to discuss serious immigration reform. No chance!
With restrictionists, even record levels of removals and historically low levels of border apprehensions are “never enough.” That’s because they are coming from a place of ideological nativism which is neither fact nor reality driven. It’s driven by inherent biases and nativist myths.
Overall, immigration is both a human reality — one that actually predated the establishment of “nation-states” — and a plus for both the immigrants and the receiving countries.
That being said, I personally think that immigration should be robust, legal, humane, and orderly. But, I doubt that “immigration without limits” is politically realistic, particularly in today’s climate.
Generally, global “market forces” affect immigration much more than nativists are willing to admit. When the legal system is too far out of line with the realities of “supply and demand” the excess is simply forced into the “extralegal market.”
That’s why we have approximately 11 million so-called “undocumented immigrants” residing in the U.S. today. Most are law abiding, gainfully employed, and have helped fuel our recent economic success. Many have formed the backbone of the unheralded “essential workforce” that has gotten us through the pandemic to this point. Many pay taxes now and all could be brought into the tax system by wiser government policies.
That’s why the mass removals touted by Trump and his White Nationalists are both impractical and counterproductive, as well as being incredibly cruel, inhumane, and cost ineffective.
There is a theory out there that although Trump’s uber-enforcement policies might be doomed to long-term failure, he is “succeeding” in another, much more damaging, way. By attacking the safety net, government, education, science, the environment, worker safety, and the rule of law while spreading racism, xenophobia, divisiveness, and maximizing income inequality, Trump has finally succeeded in making the U.S. a less desirable place for “immigrants with choices” to live.
As Bill Gelfeld wrote recently in International Policy Digest:
This pandemic has laid bare national weaknesses, and these weaknesses will have not gone unnoticed by potential and future migrants. Where they have a choice, and many skilled and even unskilled migrants do indeed have a choice, they will increasingly opt for those locales that have figured out universal health care, pandemic and crisis response, and unified national action, and these are the nations that now stand to gain from this migratory boon. https://apple.news/AiY6v3tN0SU6ES08RMUe29g
In the “post-pandemic world economy,” as our birthrate continues to go down and we need immigrants to fuel continued economic growth, the U.S. might well find itself losing the international competition for immigrants, particularly those we most want to attract.
The latter is likely if we give in to the restrictionist demand that we cut legal immigration. That simply forces more immigrants into the “extralegal market.” “Immigrants with choices” are more likely to choose destinations where they can live legally, integrate into society, and fully utilize their skills over a destination that forces them to live underground.
PWS
05-25-20