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A June 15 press release by the UndocuBlack Network succinctly captured the high-wire act most of America’s more than 11 million undocumented immigrants endure on any given day.
“As we reflect on the impact of the program over the past 11 years, we emphasize the temporariness of DACA as a solution, subject to legal and political uncertainties trapping our communities in a perpetual state of legal limbo, teetering between court decisions, administrative whims and program deadlines,” said the immigrant advocacy organization on the 11th anniversary of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.
As people like Patrice Lawrence continue to fight for and advance the interests of Black undocumented immigrants, they’re acutely aware of the human toll coming to the United States has cost many or most of the migrants. UndocuBlack and members of a number of other immigration activist organizations acknowledged that it takes a special type of person, grit, determination and an extraordinary mentality for someone in say, Haiti, El Salvador, Sierra Leone or Somalia to decide to make the oft-perilous journey to the United States.
One immigrant rights activist, the daughter of Eritrean parents, said “brave people are those who are willing to leave everything to come here.”
Most leave behind family, the familiar, the known and comfortable to search for a new, better life in America. But getting to this country is no guarantee that migrants will find the social, economic and personal freedom that they seek.
And if those who reach America’s shores are undocumented, an already difficult prospect becomes even more so. All too often, the enormous price that undocumented immigrants – women, families and unaccompanied children – pay is often overlooked.
Often, activists like Lawrence said, undocumented immigrants encounter a tattered and often nonexistent social safety net. Without a social security card, access to quality health care, schools, living accommodations and jobs are out of reach.
“Immigration is a Black issue.’ This phrase became a rallying cry for Black and immigrant communities … as the nation witnessed anti-Black racism on full display in Del Rio, Texas,” Lawrence said of the horseback attacks by Customs and Border Patrol officers against Haitians on the border. “But communities like mine have known the truth behind this phrase for far too long: Although Black immigrants comprise one of the fastest-growing segments of the immigration population, the solutions devised in Washington fail to address the needs of our communities.”
Lawrence said in an op-ed that she has suffered the consequences of U.S. immigration failures: “Despite coming to the United States more than 10 years ago, I have no real pathway to citizenship. I provide policy advice to Senate leaders, yet I could not legally drive myself to those meetings until a few years ago. On a more human level, I am denied the opportunity to care for loved ones, enjoy the company and counsel of my parents, or celebrate the companionship of friends. I was even denied the chance to meet with the first African American and female vice president. These milestones bring unbearable pain.”
But on the one hand, Lawrence said, there is hope that she will be seen.
“The reality (is) that I am peering through a looking glass, grasping but unable to be grasped,” she said. “As difficult as this experience is, it is the tip of the iceberg regarding the indignities faced by Black people. Like many Black immigrants, I am ineligible for any form of immigration reprieve, including DACA. The omission of people like me in immigration relief efforts is both a flaw and a fundamental feature of our immigration system: Black immigrants were not part of the efforts to design DACA or previous immigration relief efforts, and, as such, our needs were not addressed.”
Lawrence, UndocuBlack’s co-executive director, said the lack of political will by Congress and the Biden administration has made a path to citizenship rockier than even.
With immigration being used as a political cudgel by Republicans and the Democratic Party mounting a weak defense and promising but falling far short of following through, undocumented immigrants – especially Black migrants – have few safety nets.
“People are not given the resources, there’s wage exploitation, people are locked out of school. Many of us are part of the underground economy but we’re still paying taxes,” said Lawrence in an earlier interview. “There are health determinants which affect us but we don’t have health care or protection. People want to adjust as opportunities present themselves.”
The situation is complicated, Lawrence said, by a multiplicity of exterior factors.
“One of the reasons why the populations are different is the age you come to the U.S. and the age you lost status. Some people who’re coming here have a level of education but Black people are the most underemployed,” she said.
Lawrence said most studies won’t talk about the differences between Black and Latino undocumented people when in actuality there are clear and distinct differences.
“There are some who come to the border but the Department of Homeland Security and the ICE are not as familiar with the patterns of Caribbean and African people and will reject their applications outright,” she explained. “A lot of them are denied because the officials say their applications are fraudulent. Mauritanians are affected a lot. They had a system of slavery in that country until the 2000s. They have settled in Ohio, Michigan, Philadelphia and New Jersey. They are denied right across the board. (Former President Donald) Trump picked on them and when deported they were taken back on Moroccan Airways.”
“It is anti-Black racism. If it was a country they liked, they would have worked it out. But we see the biases of adjudication and field officers. It’s doubtful how much research they do. It is a little nuanced but makes a difference.”
The Pew Research Center, the Center for American Progress, researchers and policymakers project that Immigrants are projected to propel future growth in the American working age population as Pew said, at least through 2035.
“As the Baby Boom generation heads into retirement, immigrants and their children are expected to offset a decline in the working-age population by adding about 18 million people of working age between 2015 and 2035,” the Pew report said.
Migrants and undocumented immigrants form the backbone of America’s agriculture, food processing, hospitality, health care and construction industries, there is considerable hostility towards them primarily from Republican politicians and elected leaders. A case in point is Florida where Gov. Ron DeSantis recently championed and pushed through a law that targets immigrants and migrants in the Sunshine State.
DeSantis, the maternal great-great-grandson of an immigrant woman from Italy, has been an unapologetic supporter of harsh immigration policies and any efforts to limit immigration and close off opportunities for newly arrived asylums seekers to come to the US. Senate Bill 1718, which becomes law on July 1, rations social services for undocumented immigrants; nullifies driver’s licenses issued to undocumented immigrants in other states, places millions of the state’s tax dollars to broaden the governor’s migrant relocation program; and orders hospitals that receive Medicaid money from the federal government to ask for a patient’s immigration status. The new law also punishes employers who hire undocumented immigrants and criminalizes the act of transporting undocumented immigrants into the state.
Even before the law has been implemented, the blast radius has spread far and wide across the state and business owners, migrant rights leaders and even Republicans who supported the bill are warning about the deep and consequential effects of the bill.
According to National Public Radio, the Florida Policy Institute, a nonprofit policy research entity, approximates that with the drain of undocumented workers, Florida’s “most labor-intensive industries” would “lose 10% of their workforce and the wages they contribute along with them.” That translates to a $12.6 billion drop in Florida’s gross domestic product in one year – 1.1%– which would hammer workers’ spending power and cause less state and local tax revenues. In addition, opponents of the measure have released videos on social media showing empty construction sites and vegetable fields of fruits and vegetables where harvests are rotting and unpicked. The videos’ narrators said the job sites have been abandoned by workers afraid of the requirements for the E-Verify portion.
Those on the ground have described the immigration landscape as confusing, discordant and inconsistent. Most argue that Congress and the Biden administration could transform how immigrants and the undocumented with the stroke of a pen. Immigrant rights activists have lobbied Congress, worked closely with aides of Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, and helped craft legislation over several recent sessions but the provisions that would benefit the immigrant community have not been passed.
Anytime it comes to Black people, despite the struggle and trauma we have to prove ourselves. Title 42, the Trump-era policy, is using COVID as an excuse to get rid of the right of asylum. There is general detention enforcement centers around the country,” said Haddy Gassama, UndocuBlack’s national director of policy and advocacy in a 2022 interview.
“(President Joe) Biden campaigned to end detentions and now he’s floating the idea of home arrests vs. detentions. This is no different from prison detention. There’s a lot of work around that legislation to be passed and provide some form of protections. Time has gone by and we’ve seen immigration fall lower and lower on his priority list. Our community got you elected but we haven’t seen the results.”
Gassama and Lawrence vowed to continue the fight despite daunting challenges.
“We see and take everything with a grain of salt. Our community is used to being taken for granted. I didn’t think he’d be so much better, but I certainly didn’t expect him to double down. We have friends, family and loved ones who can vote,” Gassama said.
