During the recent U.S. presidential elections, both Harris and Trump focused on immigration as a central issue. Now that Trump has been elected president, he is threatening serious measures: mass deportations, ending automatic citizenship for children of immigrants born in the U.S., and rolling back temporary protected status for certain migrants who are escaping unsafe conditions at home.
Trump’s selection as “border czar,” Tom Homan, previously worked in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) under Trump, Obama, and four other presidential administrations. He designed Trump’s family separation policy, which took more than 5,500 children away from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border in 2018. Since then, he has worked for Fox News, and joined the Heritage Foundation to help design their Project 2025 blueprint to reshape the government with far-right policies.
Homan has learned a lot since 2018. He’s now suggesting, “families can be deported together,” including children who are U.S. citizens. Rather than addressing the problems migrants face, the Trump administration plans to terrorize families, while blaming our economic and social problems on them.
But it isn’t just Trump and his posse. Democrats were making the same threats. Harris pledged to keep Biden’s extensive asylum restrictions in place and sign a bill promising $20 billion to improve U.S. border security with bipartisan support. Both parties use immigrants as scapegoats and promise to “secure” U.S. borders to keep them out.
Immigrants are not the cause of the economic and social problems we face even if that is what the politicians like to claim. They’ve led us to believe that immigrants, particularly those who have traveled here without legal documentation, are taking social benefits and jobs away from U.S. citizens, or that they are violent criminals. But the truth is that immigrants are a crucial part of our communities, and the fragile capitalist economy would collapse without them.
At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, 74% of undocumented immigrants were in essential work categories. While immigrants (undocumented and documented) are about 14% of the U.S. population, they make up 20% of food supply chain workers– and over 30% of the most physical of those jobs. They’re a crucial part of our healthcare workforce: making up 38% of home health aides, 29% of physicians, and 22% of nursing assistants. And 30% of construction workers.
Politicians try to it make it seem like immigrants are taking jobs from native-born workers. But there is plenty of work that needs to be done, and immigrants keep communities fed, housed, and healthy. They also pay income and sales taxes to U.S. state and federal governments. In fact, the bosses continue to rely on a growing labor force of immigrants, even while they claim immigrants are a problem.
Immigrants are essential to U.S. society, and they are often forced to come to the U.S. Why? Because of the destruction of their communities and livelihoods by the policies of the same U.S. politicians who blame them for the crises we face here. The economies of much of the world, particularly in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, are completely dependent on the economic demands of U.S. corporate interests. This causes economic destabilization around the world. Faced with increasing climate disasters, and the policies of U.S.-backed political regimes that protect U.S. economic interests, many people see no way to have a livable future without migrating.
Politicians and corporate bosses also exploit immigrants to suppress everyone’s wages. Then they scapegoat immigrant workers when the inevitable crises of their economy arise. They blame their economic problems on immigrant workers – the most vulnerable people in society who have no security net.
We cannot let those in power pit us against one another. It’s a calculated distraction by the elites who hoard society’s wealth, while they try to force us to fight over the scraps they leave behind. Our enemies are not other workers, but the politicians and bosses who exploit us all. We cannot fall for their lies. Poor and working immigrants, like all poor and working people, are the backbone of our society. We are weaker when we are divided. Together we can use our power to fight for a future that values people over profit.
