The second Trump administration has begun with aggressive targeting of immigrant communities. From San Jose to Chicago to Miami, close to one thousand people a day have been arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to be deported. There are even now talks of daily quotas, 1,500 arrests nationwide, and 75 for each ICE field office. Even U.S. citizens including Native Americans have been caught up in the immigration sweeps. On top of this, Trump has shut down the resettlement process for refugees who have been previously cleared to enter the United States and has attempted to end birthright citizenship. Trump has made it clear that nowhere is a sanctuary, whether schools, hospitals or churches. This has created a climate of fear every time families drop their kids off at school, go to work, get groceries, attend medical appointments, and more.
What are the reasons that push people out of their home countries? The United States has an extensive history of destabilizing countries around the world by intervening militarily, and supporting coups and dictators around the world to defend the interests of big business. For example, the United States has supported three attempted coups in Venezuela since 2002 and has imposed sanctions that have contributed to mass food insecurity.
In addition, the destruction of ecosystems due to climate change has made more and more of the world uninhabitable. For example, warmer weather and unpredictable rain in Guatemala have drastically reduced agricultural yield, displacing hundreds of thousands of people. If the climate crisis continues at the current pace, it’s estimated that by 2050, half of the land that is currently used for coffee production will become unusable. Where will the millions of people who lose their livelihoods go?
This system destroys people’s ability to live in their homes, while criminalizing their ability to move to parts of the world that offer some promise of a future. It would be like building walls around the victims of the LA fires to prevent their movement into surrounding regions.
The politicians love to talk about who is “rightfully here” and who isn’t. Except for the indigenous population, everyone in this part of the world is here because of immigration. Whether the enslavement of Black people shipped from Africa like cargo, or the migration of workers from Ireland, China, or anywhere else, each wave of immigrants faced varying forms of exploitation and racism. At different moments in U.S. history, the ruling class has turned the flow of immigration on and off like a water faucet: let in cheap labor when times are good, shut it down and redirect the population’s anger towards immigrants when times are bad. The question of citizenship has always been an arbitrary tool to restrict people’s rights. Today, capitalism is a global system in which the economies of every country are connected to each other. Corporations and investments move freely around the world in their relentless pursuit of profit. Meanwhile displaced people are criminalized for seeking better lives by crossing borders.
We all have a stake in standing up to these brutal policies, whether documented or not. Not only is it moral to do so, but it is also in all of our self interests. In order to really stand up to any of the problems we confront – low wages, unaffordable housing, rural communities and cities falling apart – we need to unify our ranks and bridge the various divisions we face, especially the divisions between immigrant and U.S.-born workers.
We cannot sit by idly while people in our communities are terrorized. If they get away with this massive military operation on some of us, who will they target next? Not only do we need to stand up to the policies in front of us that terrorize immigrants, but we need to fight for a world where we have the right to move freely and the right to stay wherever we are, with all of our needs and aspirations met. We need a world where workers are in charge. Our struggles have no borders!
Don’t Blame Immigrants For The Problems We Face!
In addition to Trump’s extreme policies, his language feeds hateful and false ideas about immigrants. He blatantly lies and attacks immigrants, claiming that other countries are opening up their prisons, sending rapists and criminals here, and spreading vile lies about people who live and work here.
The Democrats are no champions of immigrants either. Democratic administrations carried out mass deportations and arrests, expanded border walls, separated children from their families, and even attacked Haitian migrants with mounted border guards with whips. The Democratic Party has also promoted the same scapegoating of immigrants. The Democrats have laid the groundwork for Trump and the Republican’s extreme policies.
Both parties represent the interests of this system, which defends the exploitation and oppression of the majority to enrich the few. No matter the party, we are told that recent immigrants are a cause of the many problems we face in our society. But what is the reality?
Is There a Migrant Crime Wave?
Trump has repeatedly called out a supposed epidemic of crimes committed by migrants. This is a total fiction. The threat of crime and violence is certainly a real concern that many communities are facing. But the threat of crime has nothing to do with undocumented immigrants. For example, a study by the CATO Institute of crime rates in Texas between 2013 and 2022 found that undocumented immigrants were 26 percent less likely than native born citizens to be convicted of homicide and about half as likely to be convicted of any violent crime. On top of this, while the proportion of immigrants has more than doubled from 1980 to 2022, the total crime rate has declined by over 60%.
Are Immigrants Taking Our Jobs?
Trump has doubled down on the old claim that “immigrants are taking our jobs,” particularly what he refers to as “Black or Hispanic jobs.” In fact, study after study on the national or regional scale finds that there is no relationship between the unemployment rate and the number of immigrant workers. For example, in 1980, some 125,000 Cubans immigrated to Miami as part of the “Mariel Boatlift”, leading to a rapid growth of 7% of the workforce. Despite this rapid influx of Cuban migrants, it had no significant impacts on either the unemployment rates or wages for workers. If anyone is “taking our jobs,” it is the bosses who force us to do more work with less staff, automate our jobs and outsource our jobs to countries with weaker labor and environmental protections.
Are Migrants Getting a Free Ride From Taxpayers?
The idea that immigrants don’t pay taxes is totally false. Undocumented immigrants pay an estimated $96.7 billion a year in federal, state and local taxes. This comes out to around $8,889 per undocumented immigrant every year. In most states, undocumented immigrants pay more taxes than the top 1% of income earners. Undocumented immigrants pay into fund programs like Social Security, Medicare, and unemployment insurance even though they have no access these benefits. Like anyone else, whenever immigrants go to the grocery store or fill up the gas tank, they pay sales tax. Whenever they pay rent for an apartment, they pay the landlord’s property tax. Immigrants pay income and payroll taxes through automatic withholding from their paychecks or by filing income tax returns using Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers.
“We Need to Take Care of Our Own”
Many people might say, “we need to take care of our own.” At the core, all working people, whether immigrant or native born, whether they happen to live in the same part of the world as us or not, are part of our class. They are not our enemies or competitors. When we accept the divisions imposed on us, such as between immigrants and citizens, we surrender our power. When we break through these divisions and stand together, we are able to fight back against the attacks to come. So yes, we do need to “take care of our own” and that includes all working people, regardless of citizenship status – not the rich people who live off all of us!
