‘I want to send more money home’: Remittances are a sign of sacrifice, resilience in immigrant communities during pandemic
Jun 17, 2021
This story was reported in collaboration with El Tímpano, a news outlet designed for and with Oakland’s Latino and Mayan immigrants.
Every Tuesday since the stay-at-home orders took hold last year, Dinora Hernandez heads to the food bank near her home in Oakland, California, to get milk, coffee, rice, canned fruit and oatmeal.
She says that the assistance has been a lifeline for her, her three young kids and her mom in El Salvador.
“It lets me send cash to my mom back home, to cover the basics,” said Hernandez, who managed to continue working minimal hours at a restaurant in Oakland during the pandemic, but has yet to return to her full-time schedule.
During the pandemic, the world’s top economists like Ratha were surprised by the amount of cash that continued to circulate around the world, often in increments averaging $200.
In all, people worldwide sent a total of $540 billion home last year, only dropping by 1.6% from 2019 — a smaller drop than during the 2009 global financial crash.
Ratha had predicted that remittances would drop by 20% last year.
They did slow down but then bounced back.
“That sense of resilience was visible in all the regions of the world. We were very worried back in April and May of last year that the remittance flows would be completely shut down.”
Dilip Ratha, lead economist, World Bank
“That sense of resilience was visible in all the regions of the world,” he said. “We were very worried back in April and May of last year that the remittance flows would be completely shut down.”
The remittances can help build a new home, or pay for kids’ shoes, or just food.
“Migrants are willing to cut costs if needed, skip a meal if needed, and send money home. That desire to help is what we continued to see during the pandemic.”
People were also able to keep sending remittances thanks to stimulus checks, Ratha added. In the United States, however, undocumented immigrants were excluded from federal aid.
In all, India received the most remittances — and might see more cash from abroad come in as the pandemic hits hard there, according to Ratha. China is the second-largest recipient — then Mexico. El Salvador is also among the top-receiving countries.
Remittances to Latin America and the Caribbean increased by more than 6.5% to $103 billion last year. El Salvador is a top recipient of remittances, with nearly $6 billion flowing in from abroad last year — reflecting about 24% of El Salvador’s economy.
Hernandez had also heard the news about El Salvador’s Congress approving the use of bitcoin, the cryptocurrency, as legal tender. Relatives in El Salvador sent her articles about the announcement because Salvadoran officials say bitcoin might make it easier and cheaper to send money from abroad.
Hernandez is intrigued but, like many others, isn’t sure how bitcoin works.
“Look, I know very little about it,” she said. “It’s just very strange.”
Ever since coming to the US two years ago, she has sent cash through a Western Union-style store near her house in Oakland. The service charges $10 per transaction, which Hernandez would prefer to avoid. Her mom in El Salvador needs every cent.
“She needs it for food and her medication. My mom has diabetes and can get quite severe.”
Dinora Hernandez of Oakland, California
“She needs it for food and her medication,” Hernandez said. “My mom has diabetes and can get quite severe.”
Worldwide, it’s typical that remittances are spent on urgent needs.
Hernandez says it’s never been easy to send money home regularly. And she recently took a big financial hit. Until just about two weeks ago, her family was sharing an apartment with her sister’s family in Oakland. But the landlord said too many people were living in the space and Hernandez had to move.
Her rent shot up from $600 a month for the single room she was sharing with her family to $2,000 a month for the small two-bedroom apartment she is now renting.
Drawings and writing by Cinthya Hernandez, 11, are posted on her family’s refrigerator. For a school assignment, Hernandez wrote that when she “grows up, she wants to be a lawyer to defend migrants so that they don’t have to suffer more and not be separated from their families.” Monica Campbell/The World
It helps that Hernandez’s partner just migrated up from El Salvador earlier this year, and is now working as a landscaper. The day before, he had spent $14 on a small plastic pool for the kids.
Cynthia, 11, Hernandez’s oldest child, was preparing to take the pool out to the apartment complex’s driveway and fill it up. Hernandez smiles, but she is carrying a lot. She hopes things turn around in the US, so she can go back to working full time — and help her family back home more.
“I want to send more money home,” she said. “Perhaps instead of $100, I can send $200 a month.”
ICE contracts at local, regional level spark contentious debate
May 21, 2021
On a Tuesday in May, several dozen people gathered in front of an administrative building in Woodstock, Illinois, a town of about 25,000 people, 54 miles northwest of Chicago.
Organizers held up signs that read: “Community not cages,” and “Cancel the ICE contract.”
The McHenry County Board would meet inside that building later that evening. On their voting agenda was a resolution to phase out the county jail’s contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement — also known as ICE — and stop detaining undocumented immigrants.
Immigration advocates around the county, like those in Woodstock, have waited since January for President Joe Biden to address immigration detention after he announced changes to contracts between the Department of Justice and private prisons. Biden said his goal is to end racial disparities and pave the way for fair sentencing.
But without any federal mandate to end immigration detention in county jails and private detention centers, advocates will continue to look to local and state lawmakers to act, said Silky Shah, executive director at Detention Watch Network, an advocacy group against immigration detention.
“It’s so important whenever you have these fights at the local level to show the impact of detention in your community, to signal to the federal government, ‘Hey, actually this is not OK and this shouldn’t be happening.’”
“It’s so important whenever you have these fights at the local level to show the impact of detention in your community, to signal to the federal government, ‘Hey, actually this is not OK, and this shouldn’t be happening,’” she said.
Canceling existing contracts can be a tough sell, especially when these communities have depended on those federal dollars and the jobs that come with running detention centers, Shah said.
But the pandemic did decrease the number of immigrants being detained nationwide, Shah said. That has left people wondering whether the same amount of detention centers are necessary.
“With COVID, there was a reduction in the number of people detained for a bunch of reasons because the border was closed because a lot of people were continuing to be deported, and [there were] less enforcement operations,” she said.
Still, In Illinois, the McHenry County Board voted to keep their county jail’s partnership with ICE. The jail has beds for 250 immigrants. The county receives $95 a day from the federal government for each detainee in custody. But during the pandemic, many of those went unused.
According to county data, for the fiscal year 2020, the jail’s average daily number of undocumented immigrant detainees was 189, compared to 279 and 275, for 2019 and 2018, respectively.
It was a contentious debate. The majority of board members weren’t convinced that ending the ICE contract would make a difference. Instead, they’d prefer to wait for the federal government to issue a mandate.
“This county board does not have the ability to solve the immigration problem in this country, and that’s why I’m not voting to eliminate the contract that we have with ICE.”
Joseph Gottemoller, board member, McHenry County
“This county board does not have the ability to solve the immigration problem in this country, and that’s why I’m not voting to eliminate the contract that we have with ICE,” said county board member Joseph Gottemoller.
Others were concerned about where the detainees would go if the contract ends, and if moving detainees across state lines to other states would be an inconvenience for their families.
“To send people someplace else — I will be voting no on this for that fact alone. The money is not the issue to me, I believe we can cut budgets,” said Jim Kearns, another board member.
Immigration advocates gather outside the county building in McHenry County, Woodstock, Illinois on Tuesday, May 18, 2021.Courtesy of David Volden
Undocumented immigrants like Johannes Favi said this is a moral issue, and that more board members should have voted to end the contract. Favi is an immigrant from Benin who spent close to a year detained at the Jerome Combs Detention Center in Kankakee, another Illinois county jail that contracts with ICE. He also wants to see ICE contracts end — and detention altogether. He drove to Woodstock from his home in Indiana to speak at the meeting.
“I know [migrant detention] is wrong. And if nobody stands to do something against it, well, it’ll keep happening.”
Johannes Favi, immigrant from Benin now living in Indiana
“I do that because for me, it’s just common sense to fight for what is right. And I’ve lived it. So I know this is wrong. And if nobody stands to do something against it, well, it’ll keep happening,” Favi said.
Amanda Hall, co-founder of the Coalition to Cancel the ICE Contract in McHenry County, and who lives in Woodstock, said many community members also supported ending the contract. Those community members want everyone to be respected and recognized, she said.
“Having ICE in our community causes fear and causes trauma … it’s not something that should be allowed.”
Amanda Hall, co-founder, Coalition to Cancel the ICE Contract in McHenry County
“Having ICE in our community causes fear and causes trauma … it’s not something that should be allowed,” Hall said.
The outcome was disappointing, said Maria Valdez, a volunteer with the Elgin Coalition for Immigrant Rights, a member of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights. But it’s important to keep the momentum going, she said. The movement in Woodstock captivated community members who had never been involved in organizing before.
“So, I think that a silver lining of this is that it mobilizes people, right? It makes people feel angry, more passionate and engaged to be able to push for something.”
Valdez is hopeful change will come. She and other organizers want more counties and states to join the movement and show the federal government this is necessary.
“It is always a good time to do the right thing.”
Maria Valdez, volunteer, Elgin Coalition for Immigrant Rights
“So is it a good time? It is always a good time to do the right thing. And are we going to win? I think we have a good chance,” she said.
Inside a migrant shelter for men: Untold stories of trauma, challenges
Apr 27, 2021
It had been 15 years since Alfonso, 60, last crossed the US-Mexico border.
He never dreamed he would be back, but Alfonso sat eating rice and beans at a migrant shelter in Sonoyta, a town in the northern Mexican state of Sonora, alongside his 25-year-old son, Ricardo.
Providing for his children was his motivation for crossing the border four times, decades ago, but his son was the reason he went back.
Both Ricardo and his father requested to only use their first names, because Ricardo wanted to cross over undetected by US officials.
A 30-foot border wall outside the town of Sonoyta, Mexico, placed along the US-Mexico border during the Trump administation, as seen from the Mexican side.Ana Adlerstein
“He was afraid of doing it alone,” Alfonso said. “As I’d done it before, he asked me to come with him to help.” And so he did.
Most news coverage about migrants on the border focuses on families, women and unaccompanied minors.
But single, male migrants — like Alfonso and Ricardo — have consistently made up the bulk of the individuals who cross the southwest border without being detected by US authorities.
Ricardo, like most of the men in the shelter, was not seeking asylum. He was coming to the US to work.
Camouflage clothing sold outside a tire alignment shop, used by migrants trying to cross the desert undetected.Ana Adlerstein
He had made three attempts. Each time, he headed into the desert with a group for one or two days before being chased and apprehended by Border Patrol, and sent back to Mexico. But Ricardo was committed. His plan was to travel to Las Vegas, Nevada, to work in construction with his uncle.
While Alfonso understood and supported his son’s mission, he was heartbroken to see his family, once again, split by economic need. Because of Alfonso’s past sacrifices, Ricardo had one big leg up, though. He was the first in his family to go to college.
Ricardo was just one semester from earning his psychology degree when he realized that he just wasn’t going to earn enough to make a stable home for his family. Still, his psychology studies proved invaluable, especially as he faced the desert.
“If you just go along thinking, ‘They’re going to catch us, they’re going to catch us,’ or ‘I’m so thirsty, I’m so hungry,’ the body follows suit,” Ricardo said. When he would walk through the desert, he would focus on his family to keep his spirits up.
“I’m telling you, the human mind is really powerful,” he said.
And when crossing the Sonoran Desert in Arizona, you need all the power you can get.
Abandoned water bottles used by migrants in the active Barry M. Goldwater bombing range in southern Arizona — a stretch of desert that Ricardo walked through during his attempts to enter the US.Ana Adlerstein
Since 1998, some 7,000 migrant remains have been found in southern Arizona. But the real number of deaths could be much higher. And the desert isn’t the only risk. Many face extortion, kidnapping and other forms of abuse on their way north.
“The shelter’s bunkroom is filled with shouts of the men’s nightmares.”
Ricardo
“Sometimes,” Ricardo said, “the shelter’s bunkroom is filled with shouts of the men’s nightmares, reliving the trauma they’ve experienced through their trips.” It was times like these that Ricardo was even more grateful to have his father alongside him.
“When I’ve failed to cross and I’m sent back, my feet are covered in blisters. Sometimes what you want more than anything is a pat on the back and someone to tell you, ‘Everything’s gonna be OK.’” Material support is good, but he learned both through books and lived experience that moral support is invaluable.
“You make your own path by walking it. … Sometimes it’s terrifying, but there is no other option than to keep going.”
Ricardo
“You make your own path by walking it,” Ricardo, said, referencing Spanish poet Antonio Machado. “Sometimes it’s terrifying, but there is no other option than to keep going.”
The last time Ricardo left the shelter, he didn’t come back. He made it into the US. His father, Alfonso, got on a plane, home to central Mexico.
Both father and son pray that they are the last generation to have to continue to make this journey to support their families.
Cuban Americans make plea to Biden administration for help on immigration limbo
Apr 16, 2021
In November 2019, about 40 people packed into a conference room at the Westchester Regional Library that sits at the heart of Miami-Dade’s suburban Cuban American community.
The group whispered among themselves and occasionally raised their voices in exasperation, seeking answers to a problem that continues to affect thousands of South Florida families to this day.
The topic of concern: the Cuban Family Reunification Parole Program. For years, the program has served as a straightforward, legal way to reunite Cuban families in the US.
The issues with the program were complicated by geopolitics.
After staff at the US Embassy in Havana were mysteriously injured in what the US believes to be sonic attacks, the Trump administration all but shut down the embassy and removed staff at the end of 2017. And as the staff went away, all of the families that were enrolled in the program were left in limbo, with no one to conduct the necessary interviews and to process the piles of paperwork.
A woman passes out prayer beads to a gathering of people affected by the pause in the family reunification program at the Ermita de la Caridad National Shrine in Miami, taken in March.Daniel Rivero/WLRN
By 2019, the embassy was still largely shut down and families had been waiting years to reunite with their loved ones, with no end in sight.
“My family has been completely [torn] apart.”
Claudia Bringuier, who arrived in the US at the age of 20
“My family has been completely [torn] apart,” said Claudia Bringuier, who was 27 at the time. She arrived in the US at the age of 20 and had paid $2,000 to get her parents into the program.
“My parents get sick, and I get sick and I’m here by myself,” she said. “I’m lucky enough to have people I love and I want them with me. Some people maybe don’t have them, and don’t have this issue. I do.”
Bringuier is still waiting to reunite with her parents through the program.
The group gathered in Westchester to hear from two lawmakers, who were not of Cuban origin, but who nonetheless were seeking solutions to their concerns.
Then-Democratic Representative Debbie Mucarsel-Powell was sponsoring a bill that would have forced the State Department, under President Trump, to start processing the cases — through offering options like video conferencing. Then-Representative Donna Shalala co-sponsored the bill, and she was also present.
“We denounce the Cuban government, but let’s not punish the Cuban families that are suffering the consequences of that government.”
Former Democratic Representative Debbie Mucarsel-Powell
“We denounce the Cuban government, but let’s not punish the Cuban families that are suffering the consequences of that government,” said Mucarsel-Powell at the time. “There should be bipartisan support on this program. The [Trump] administration is not taking action, then we need to.”
“We are begging the administration officials to move these cases,” added Shalala. “This is not new immigration law. This is asking the administration to implement existing law.”
Cuban Americans call on Biden administration to help reunite their families.Daniel Rivero/WLRN
The law that created the Cuban Family Reunification Parole Program was signed in 2007 by former President George W. Bush.
The bill that would have forced the Trump administration to start working through the backlog of cases was introduced to the House of Representatives, but it never received any votes or even a committee hearing.
‘The years have gone by us’
With President Joe Biden in office now, some Cuban American families stuck in limbo are hoping that things will soon change. To date, an estimated 22,000 family reunification cases have been stuck in the immigration backlog, as basic services remain on hold at the US Embassy in Havana.
On a recent Sunday, dozens of Cuban families gathered at the Ermita de la Caridad National Shrine in Miami in a show of solidarity with one another, hoping to spur changes from the Biden administration.
“I claimed my son in March of 2016,” said Marietta Medialdea.
Medialdea held a heart-shaped box with a written plea to President Biden and a T-shirt featuring photos of her son. She came to the US in 2014 seeking liberty and said she never imagined the clearly-outlined legal process would still be dragging on. Her son was only 13 years old when she first claimed him, she said. Now, he is about to turn 18.
“We’re asking Biden to restart consular services in Cuba. We’ve done everything the way that they asked us to.”
Marietta Medialdea, Cuban mother
“Right on the edge of them taking him to do his year of service in the Cuban military,” she said. Conscription for the military is mandatory in Cuba, something that keeps her up at night. “We’re asking Biden to restart consular services in Cuba. We’ve done everything the way that they asked us to,” she said.
Marietta Medialdea holds a heart-shaped candy box with a message to President Biden to restart consular services in Cuba.Daniel Rivero/WLRN
Without a functioning US Embassy in Cuba, the only way for her to be able to bring her son to Miami would be by setting up an interview for him at a US Embassy in a third country: Guyana.
But even this is off-limits for Medialdea. She can’t afford the trip.
“He’s a minor, so I would have to go with him,” she said. “That means two plane tickets, two mouths to feed, two everything.”
She whimpered in the arms of a friend while explaining her situation.
“The years have gone by us,” she cried.
The Robaina family came so close to reuniting with their loved ones.
“My family was at the embassy in Havana in 2017. They went on an interview, they were approved. They have a paper saying ‘Welcome to the United States of America,’ come back to pick your visa up next month.”
Niubis Robaina, a Cuban American, hoping to reunite with her cousin, aunt and uncle
“My family was at the embassy in Havana in 2017. They went on an interview, they were approved. They have a paper saying ‘Welcome to the United States of America,’ come back to pick your visa up next month,” said Niubis Robaina, who is hoping to reunite with her cousin, aunt and uncle.
“They closed the embassy and all of their documents are in there. For over three years.”
Robaina harbors a small amount of optimism because the Biden administration seems more immigration-friendly than the previous administration.
“But at the same time, I don’t know what’s going to happen,” she said.
The impacted families have spent the last three years sending letters, calling members of Congress — of both political parties — and launching a social media campaign to bring awareness to their situation. Robaina has been active on all fronts, but now watches the Biden administration move forward with other kinds of immigration reforms with a bit of unease.
“Right now they did everything for Venezuelans, for the people in Mexico — I am all for it. I want immigration to happen to this country — I’m here and I’m a professional in this country because of it,” she said. “But I want it for my family, too. We did it legally. We paid thousands of dollars for it. We went to the lawyers. We waited for it. It’s not fair.”
An uptick in rafts to the US
In addition to the Cuban Family Reunification Parole Program cases that have been held up with a scaled-back US Embassy in Havana, more than 78,000 other immigrant visas from Cuba have been backlogged, bringing the total to more than 100,000 pending cases.
The worsening economic conditions on the island, due to the coronavirus pandemic, increased US sanctions, newly created obstacles to sending remittances to the island and repressive Cuban economic policies, have formed a worrying cumulative effect.
Since October, 152 Cubans have been intercepted on the water en route to the US, according to the US Coast Guard. In the previous fiscal year, there were only 49 interceptions, although those numbers might have been impacted by the coronavirus pandemic.
The uptick is notable, but still far below years past. For instance, 1,468 Cubans were intercepted in 2017, and 5,396 in 2016.
A Coast Guard cutter interdicts 17 Cuban migrants aboard a vessel approximately 54 miles south of Key West, March 18, 2021. The migrants were sent back to Cuba.US Coast Guard
Some boats have quietly made it to Florida’s shores, and others have not been so lucky.
One boat originating from northern Cuba and bound for the US was capsized in the Bahamas in March, resulting in at least one death and many missing passengers. Another raft just off the coast of Martin County, Florida, capsized in February, although everyone survived.
Also in March, federal agents arrested four people in the Florida Keys under charges that they were running a migrant-trafficking operation from Cuba, based out of Key Largo and Homestead. The alleged operators were charging up to $10,000 per-person for the trip, according to court records.
Cuba ‘simply cannot be trusted’ to keep embassy safe
In a statement to WLRN, the State Department said it cannot provide a date when consular services in Havana might return to normal. In the meantime, any Cuban wishing to get a visa to come to the US should proceed to the designated third-country embassy in Guyana, said the department.
Florida Senator Marco Rubio said in a statement to WLRN that any potential threat of mysterious sonic attacks need to be put in place before the regular consular services can resume on the island.
“While I understand the importance of the Cuban Family Reunification Parole Program in helping Cuban families reunite, the Cuban regime has proven that it simply cannot be trusted with our diplomatic corps’ well-being and safety.”
Senator Marco Rubio, Florida
“While I understand the importance of the Cuban Family Reunification Parole Program in helping Cuban families reunite, the Cuban regime has proven that it simply cannot be trusted with our diplomatic corps’ well-being and safety,” said Rubio.
“The customary functions of the US Embassy in Havana cannot return to normal as long as our diplomats, who assist with these applications, remain at risk of direct attacks. The Cuban regime is either conducting these attacks themselves or allowing them to continue in violation of their international treaty commitments.”
Former Democratic Representative Joe Garcia said that clearly “something happened” at the embassy and the US still needs to get answers. But he fears the attacks were capitalized upon by Republicans like Rubio and Trump, who opposed the 2015 normalization of diplomatic relations with Cuba in the first place, long before the mysterious attacks.
“The Trump administration in particular bungled the investigation, but used it as a pretext to further put pressure on Cuba and close this embassy. … This is what classically happens when rhetoric takes over policy.”
Former Democratic Representative Joe Garcia
“The Trump administration in particular bungled the investigation, but used it as a pretext to further put pressure on Cuba and close this embassy,” said Garcia. “This is what classically happens when rhetoric takes over policy.”
The Biden administration has launched its own review of the mysterious suspected sonic attacks. Yet even if clear-cut answers about what happened are not learned through the review, Garcia said the current status quo of not offering any consular services in Havana is unsustainable for regular Cubans and Cuban American families.
Desperate families wanting to reunite are being left without viable options, he said.
“That you’re gonna make them travel to Guyana, spend two weeks there for processing, to then return to Cuba, to come to the United States, it just — it boggles the mind that we can’t find a better way to do this,” Garcia said.
“The government of the United States reminds you that taking to the seas in these inadequate rafts is illegal and extremely dangerous,” Lt. Cmdr. Mario Gil, the Coast Guard liaison officer at the embassy, says in the video.
“We ask you to use the pathways that are legal, secure and orderly to immigrate to the United States.”
Refugees stuck in limbo over Biden’s inaction to restore admissions program
Apr 13, 2021
There’s been a steady focus on migrants arriving at the US-Mexico border. But refugees — less in the spotlight — have seen their chances of entry to the US grind to a halt, leaving them in unexpected limbo.
Many refugees have already been vetted and approved for entry through official US and United Nations agencies, but President Joe Biden has yet to make an official commitment to rebuilding the US refugee program.
Basuze Madogo, who helps resettle refugees through World Relief, a nonprofit based in Memphis, Tennessee, has recently needed to inform families that relatives who they hoped to welcome at airports would not arrive as scheduled — at least not yet.
Madogo even had to break the news to his own brother. He thought his wife, from Democratic Republic of Congo, would join him in Tennessee in March.
“It left him very devastated. … But I told him in a way to give him hope. That it wasn’t an issue of his wife’s case, it was more about waiting for the president to sign the deal.”
Basuze Madogo, World Relief
“It left him very devastated,” said Madogo. “But I told him in a way to give him hope. That it wasn’t an issue of his wife’s case, it was more about waiting for the president to sign the deal.”
Former President Donald Trump steadily cut the number of refugees allowed into the US, setting the admissions goal in his final fiscal year in office at 15,000 refugees — the lowest level since the signing of the Refugee Act in 1980, which established the US system.
As a candidate, Joe Biden promised to restore the program immediately. In early February, he reiterated that promise in his first foreign policy speech, saying:
“I’m approving an executive order to begin the hard work of restoring our refugee admissions program to help meet the unprecedented global need. It’s going to take time to rebuild what has been so badly damaged, but that’s precisely what we’re going to do.”
Biden proposed a new plan for refugee admissions in fiscal year 2021 that would increase the ceiling to 62,500 — with a promise to move that total to 125,000 for his first full fiscal year in office.
Things looked so certain that more than 700 vetted and approved refugees were booked on recent flights to the US, in coordination with the State Department and refugee resettlement agencies.
Yet, Biden has not signed the document, the presidential determination that puts such changes into effect. Without that signature, Trump’s version of the US refugee program, with its restrictions, is left in place.
In turn, booked flights have been canceled by the State Department. Trump’s restrictions and limits remain in place and US officials have yet to explain why. Those working on behalf of refugees, along with families waiting for loved ones, are left frustrated.
The State Department did not grant The World an interview, but a spokesperson pointed to the executive order issued by Biden and wrote that it “establishes a pathway to rebuild and expand the US Refugee Admissions Program that is commensurate with global need, with our values as a nation, and consistent with domestic law and international obligations, while ensuring the security and integrity of the program.”
US officials have denied that the delay is linked to the increasing number of migrants at the US-Mexico border and resources dedicated to that challenge.
Those critical of the delay emphasize that before Biden submitted his plan to Congress to raise the number of admitted refugees to the US, resettlement agencies reviewed it to ensure that resources and capacity were in place.
“All of those boxes were checked,” said Nazarin Ash, vice president for global policy and advocacy with the International Rescue Committee, a nonprofit humanitarian aid group based in Washington, DC.
“I wasn’t concerned about either the capacity or the resources to receive refugees. This is an opportunity to affirm the US’ bipartisan tradition of assisting the most vulnerable.”
Nazarin Ash, vice president for global policy and advocacy, International Rescue Committee
“I wasn’t concerned about either the capacity or the resources to receive refugees. This is an opportunity to affirm the US’ bipartisan tradition of assisting the most vulnerable.”
Angie Plummer, executive director of Community Refugee and Immigration Services, a nonprofit in Columbus, Ohio, said that keeping refugee families in limbo is like “salt in the wound,” after years of delays and severe restrictions under the Trump administration.
“If it is a political consideration, connected to the situation at the border, the important thing to keep in mind is real people who have already been suffering for so long are going to continue to suffer.”
Angie Plummer, executive director, Community Refugee and Immigration Services, Colombus, Ohio
“If it is a political consideration, connected to the situation at the border, the important thing to keep in mind is real people who have already been suffering for so long are going to continue to suffer.”
Plummer’s organization helps new refugees settle in the US. After Biden’s February speech, her colleagues began the work of lining up jobs, apartments and furniture for newcomers they thought would be here by now. She believes the Biden administration wants to allow in more refugees.
“I have no doubt that they want to support the program. I’m hopeful there’ll be some transparency and we’ll find out soon,” she said.
But the delay also risks real complications. The refugee selection process involves extensive security and medical screenings, and one of the screenings that Madogo’s sister-in-law underwent is now about to expire.
That could mean starting a months-long process all over again.
“My mom and the rest of the family was supposed to come.”
Kajene Etienne, 28, truck driver, Ohio
“My mom and the rest of the family was supposed to come,” said Kajene Etienne, 28, a truck driver who lives in Columbus, Ohio. He spoke while hauling auto parts to Flint, Michigan, across state lines in a freight truck. He logged 450 miles before heading home.
Kajene Etienne, 28, is a refugee who has resettled in Columbus, Ohio.Courtesy of Kajene Etienne
In many ways, Etienne’s life has been one on the move. He was born in DR Congo but, at age 3, his family fled civil war.
After many years in a refugee camp in Rwanda, Etienne was allowed into the US in late 2013. His brother followed a few years later.
His mom and siblings had been approved to enter, as well, but Donald Trump became president and decided that the US would take in far fewer refugees. He also banned many applicants from majority-Muslim and African countries.
Etienne’s family has since waited for the greenlight to enter the US from a crowded refugee camp in Rwanda, joining tens of thousands of other refugees worldwide also approved to enter the US.
Etienne’s mother, Mukobwajana Kandenzi, feels stranded in Rwanda, where she has spent more than seven years at the large Gihembe refugee camp.
“I hoped to be in the US with my sons by now,” she said, speaking Kinyarwanda, a Bantu language, as her son translates during one of his regular calls home. He regularly spends $10 on a prepaid card that lets him speak with his mom for 35 minutes over her old flip phone.
Mukobwajana Kandenzi, 58, (right) from Democratic Republic of Congo, poses for a photo at the Gihembe refugee camp in Rwanda.Courtesy of Kajene Etienne
Kandezi, 58, lives with thousands of other Congolese in the refugee camp, in small identical brick homes, lined up in tight rows. Eitenne wires cash to her and his siblings for food, clothing and the basics.
Many families at the camp where Kandenzi lives were expecting to go to the US soon.
She wants to deliver a message to President Biden:
“First of all, to thank him for the fact that he’s willing to bring people in to change their lives. And to wish him a good life.”
She also hopes that he signs off on the presidential determination soon, so that she can see her sons after years of being apart.
But last summer, Ponce and more than a dozen workers’ rights groups saw an opportunity to speak out against the gender discrimination and pay inequity that she and many others have faced as seasonal workers.
The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) replaced the 26-year-old North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), and with it came an enforceable labor chapter allowing certain workers in Mexico to unionize. It also gives migrant workers like Ponce a pathway to filing complaints directly with each government.
Ponce, now 38, and another female worker submitted a petition in March. They’re alleging gender discrimination during the recruitment process in Mexico and pay discrimination in the US under Title VII, or the Equal Pay Act.
“It’s a petition for both governments,” she said. “Please stop it with this perception people have of us [female workers].”
Ponce left her home state of Hidalgo in central Mexico after high school graduation to work at a Louisiana chocolate factory during holiday seasons like Easter and Valentine’s Day.
She received an H-2B visa, designated for nonagricultural work, mostly in factories and warehouses. But the pay is much less than what farmworkers would typically make, she said.
All of her co-workers were women, she said, sorting and packing chocolates in assembly lines. The men stacked boxes and earned more, she said.
“A group of us spoke up to demand better treatment, equal opportunities, but we were told we were problematic women and that we weren’t wanted there anymore,” Ponce recalled.
Gaspar Rivera-Salgado, a project director with the UCLA Labor Center, said labor complaints to the US under NAFTA were not successful because clear, enforceable guidelines did not exist, so workers were often left wondering who to turn to for help.
Maritza Perez, who filed the petition with Ponce, testified that she submitted a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunities Commission (EEOC) in 2019 after experiencing discrimination on the job in the US, but has yet to hear back. That, she said, was the only opportunity she saw to call attention to her concerns.
Rivera-Salgado said that under the new agreement, Ponce and Perez’s allegations could set a win for labor — if both countries manage to address them.
“This is a test of how this is going to work on the US side. … An opening to test the limits of that agreement, and especially because at the core of the agreement is the recognition of international discriminatory standards.”
Gaspar Rivera-Salgado, Gaspar Rivera-Salgado, project director, UCLA Labor Center
“This is a test of how this is going to work on the US side,” Rivera-Salgado said. “An opening to test the limits of that agreement, and especially because at the core of the agreement is the recognition of international discriminatory standards.”
Ponce and other advocates are also calling for an independent investigation.
Rivera-Salgado said whatever comes from that could help the US, Mexico and Canada pinpoint changes to their agreement. But, he said, those updates take a long time.
“I think that one thing that we need to understand is that trade agreements are very difficult political processes in the three countries,” he said.
The US government, however, can take other steps while those changes come, said Melanie Stratton Lopez, supervising attorney with Centro de los Derechos del Migrante (CDM), a nonprofit working on labor issues in Mexico and the US.
The group is also backing Ponce’s petition.
Stratton Lopez said workers like Ponce with H-2B visas are treated differently from workers on other visas who often have free legal access in case they run into problems with their employers. The H-2B visa holders don’t have that access.
“We have workers that are very vulnerable, that are often in rural areas, and then by law, are excluded from accessing free legal services.”
Melanie Stratton-Lopez, supervising attorney, Centro de los Derechos del Migrante
“And so, that’s something that really should change. We have workers that are very vulnerable, that are often in rural areas, and then by law, are excluded from accessing free legal services.”
As for Ponce, she’s looking ahead. Even though she’s back living in the Mexican state of Hidalgo where she lives with her parents, she’s in the process of applying for another worker’s visa.
This time, she’s hopeful she’ll get to work at a farm. And she has several friends hoping for the same thing, too.
“It’s our dream,” she said. “We’d love to get an H-2A visa, but if we can’t, then H-2B will have to do. The point is to go and work.”
After Texas freeze, immigrants play critical role in repairing tens of thousands of homes
Mar 12, 2021
Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story was originally produced by Houston Public Media and has been updated for The World.
For the last three weeks, Houston plumber Eduardo Dolande has been working long hours to help repair burst pipes in local homes and businesses.
Just in his own Houston neighborhood of Cypress, Dolande, who has worked as a plumber for 21 years, said he’s helped about a dozen families with their pipes — as a favor, free of charge. The destruction he’s seen inside some homes looks like something out of a movie, he said.
“It’s just wet sheetrock everywhere, and then the insulation that was up in the attic was on the floor. … It just looked horrible.”
Eduardo Dolande, plumber, Houston, Texas
“It’s just wet sheetrock everywhere, and then the insulation that was up in the attic was on the floor,” Dolande said, “It just looked horrible.”
One of the damaged homes was his own. At one point, he ran out of supplies to fix his own pipes after using them to help his neighbors. His plumber friends eventually helped him find some replacement parts, which have been in short supply since the storm.
He had to cut open parts of his ceiling in two bathrooms and other parts of the house to reach busted pipes and repair them. Since he knew to turn off his water before the freeze, the damage in his own home was minimal — but the family still had water all over the floors while they tried to fix multiple burst pipes.
Dolande said his neighborhood was also hit hard by Hurricane Harvey, but that the freeze was worse because it took people by surprise.
“No power, no water,” Dolande said. “People get desperate over that.”
“I’ve never seen that much damage in homes,” he said. “Never.”
In the aftermath of the storm, plumber Eduardo Dolande also had to fix the pipes in his own home.Courtesy of the Dolande family
Texas’ largest insurer, State Farm, has reported more than 44,000 claims in the state related to the winter storm. That’s more than 10 times the total number of burst pipe claims they saw nationally in 2020.
And immigrant workers — like Dolande, who is from Panama — are critical to repairing that damage, according to Jeremy Robbins, director of the New American Economy think tank.
“As people are trying to build back, they’re trying to repair their houses, they’re trying to figure out how to survive the damage, immigrants are playing outsized roles in so many of the professions that are essential to the Texas economy,” Robbins said.
The group’s analysis of 2019 American Community Survey data found that in the city of Houston, about 40% of plumbers and 63% of construction workers are foreign-born.
In Texas, 27% of the state’s plumbers and 40% of construction workers are foreign-born, though immigrants make up about 17% of the population. And the share of immigrant workers is even higher when other labor-intensive jobs are taken into consideration.
“If you look at drywall installers or ceiling tile installers and tapers, more than 75% of them nationwide are immigrants.”
Jeremy Robbins, director, New American Economy
“If you look at drywall installers or ceiling tile installers and tapers, more than 75% of them nationwide are immigrants,” Robbins said.
Houston plumber Eduardo Dolande shows where pipes burst inside his own home during the Texas freeze.Elizabeth Trovall/Houston Public Media
These workers will play a critical role as second responders, since many ceilings — like Dolande’s — have been damaged from burst pipes.
Steven Scarborough, strategic initiatives manager for the Center for Houston’s Future, said without immigrants, weeks-long repair wait times would last even longer.
“Imagine all these stories you’ve heard, how long people [are] waiting for plumbers, and increase that by 37%,” he said.
Though these immigrant workers are essential to storm recovery in Houston, many come from communities that tend to be disproportionately impacted by catastrophic events.
A Rice University survey found nearly two-thirds of Hispanic immigrants in Houston could not come up with $400 to pay for an emergency expense. And those families are also less likely to reach out for aid in a crisis, Scarborough said.
Eduardo Dolande and his wife, Mitzila Guerra, became United States citizens after immigrating from Panama.Elizabeth Trovall/Houston Public Media
Eduardo Dolande is a citizen — but many Texas plumbers and hundreds of thousands of construction workers are undocumented. And they’ve become a convenient political punching bag for Republicans in recent years.
During a press conference earlier this week, Governor Greg Abbott told Texans, “There is a crisis on the Texas border right now with the overwhelming number of people who are coming across the border.” Abbott often frames unauthorized immigration as a threat.
The governor also recently reopened the state and lifted the mask mandate — a move that confounded Jessica Diaz, who works with day laborers and other immigrant workers as legal manager for the Fe y Justicia Worker Center in Houston.
“I want to understand what his point of view is…how we came to the conclusion that this is a good idea?” she said.
Diaz said she’s concerned about lifting the mask mandate while less than 10% of the state has been fully vaccinated.
During the pandemic, her organization has received nearly 400 safety and health complaints. She said day laborers — who offer cheap, immediate repairs — put themselves in vulnerable situations to secure work.
“Whoever gets in the car the fastest is the one that’s going to get the job. You don’t even ask how much they’re going to pay you. You don’t even ask about the employer, who they are or where they’re taking you.”
Jessica Diaz, legal manager, Fe y Justicia Worker Center, Houston, Texas
“Whoever gets in the car the fastest is the one that’s going to get the job. You don’t even ask how much they’re going to pay you. You don’t even ask about the employer, who they are or where they’re taking you,” Diaz said.
In the four weeks after Hurricane Harvey, the University of Illinois found that more than a quarter of day laborers had experienced wage theft.
The Fe y Justicia Worker Center is already investigating wage theft claims from workers who helped with winter storm recovery.
“This is something we have seen repeatedly since Hurricane Harvey. Houston, in general, is a city that is in constant reconstruction mode,” she said.
The pattern of disaster, recovery and abuse is all too familiar — and Diaz said she doesn’t see anything changing soon.
Eduardo Dolande, who first came to the United States as a tourist in his early 20s, and became a citizen through his wife, Mitzila Guerra, said he hopes people can see that immigrants like him — including those without legal status — are helping the city rebuild.
“We are everywhere. We are helping everybody,” Dolande said. “Whether they say they don’t need us, or they don’t want to accept it, it is so obvious.”
Immigrants, rights activists call on Biden to end private detention
Feb 10, 2021
Last month President Joe Biden instructed the Department of Justice to end contract renewals with private prisons as a first step to end racial disparities and pave the way to fair sentencing.
But Biden, who ran on promises to make sweeping changes to immigration policy, left private immigration detention untouched, allowing the Department of Homeland Security to continue renewing contracts with these private facilities.
For years, immigrants in detention and advocacy groups have documented a lack of oversight and physical and mental abuse at the facilities. Today, about 80% of immigrants in detention centers are in private detention, according to an American Civil Liberties Union report.
Advocates say that ending the migrant detention system is one more piece of the puzzle in achieving racial justice and ending migrant abuse.
In 2020, 170,000 people cycled through detention, which is an unusually low number compared to other years. The pandemic, along with former President Donald Trump’s tough policies on immigration contributed to those lower numbers. Policies like the Migrant Protection Protocols, also known as “Remain in Mexico,” kept asylum-seekers on the Mexican side of the US-Mexico border.
Still, detention continues to be a lucrative business.
The US government used to oversee immigration detention. But that changed after 9/11 with the creation of the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Immigration detention expanded after that, and US officials turned to private prison companies to manage this work. The companies jumped right in.
“They [companies] started seeing the federal government as a place to have these more lucrative contracts,” said Silky Shah, executive director of the Detention Watch Network, an immigration detention advocacy group.
The group has tracked the increasing privatization of the detention system during the Trump administration, with more multimillion-dollar contracts signed by key companies such as CoreCivic Inc and GEO Group.
During the pandemic, many immigration detention centers have also become COVID-19 hot spots. These private companies say they take safety seriously, especially during the pandemic. Immigrants are given face masks and medical attention, they say.
But addressing abuse and neglect is only the beginning of a much larger detention problem, Shah said.
It’s also about racial justice.
“What we know about these systems [is] that [they] disproportionately target people of color and Black people, and we’re seeing that even now, in the context of who is currently in detention and who is being deported.”
“What we know about these systems [is] that [they] disproportionately target people of color and Black people, and we’re seeing that even now, in the context of who is currently in detention and who is being deported,” she said.
Biden said he wants to address racial inequity inside detention centers, too.
But unwinding these contracts might be more of a battle. Last August, the Trump administration renewed contracts with GEO Group and CoreCivic, Inc., in Texas, to run two facilities for an additional 10 years.
Any steps Biden takes now need clear deadlines to phase out these and other private contracts, said Jesse Franzblau, a policy analyst with the National Immigrant Justice Center, which provides direct legal services to immigrants.
Franzblau said giving these companies a two-year deadline is reasonable, and the federal government has the authority to do so.
“But they need direction from above to start carrying that out,” he said.
Advocates also stress the fact that nearly one-third of immigrants held in detention centers don’t have a criminal record. And many others have minor nonviolent offenses.
Shah points to other options.
“There are models that include GPS monitoring that are just alternative forms of detention. And so, I think the alternatives that do work are, one, people should just be with their families,” she said.
GPS monitoring involves ankle bracelets to track people while their immigration cases go through the courts. States like California and Florida do this more than other states, although the practice has also come under scrutiny.
Shah said it’s possible that Biden could be holding back on dealing with immigration detention as a way to leverage his other immigration goals.
But with Alejandro Mayorkas’ recent appointment to secretary of Homeland Security, along with Biden’s recent executive orders addressing deportations and travel bans, Shah said there could be some shifts in how the agency operates around detention.
Still, advocates like Shah and Franzblau say ending contracts with private detention centers is only a fractional part of a larger, problematic system. There are other aspects to address — like county jails. An executive order phasing out private contracts might not apply to county jails that also contract with the federal government to detain immigrants.
Johannes Favi is an immigration rights activist. David VoldenThis impacts people such as Johannes Favi, 33, from Benin.
“It’s just horrible to live in detention, you know, you just want to give up on everything.”
Johannes Favi, former migrant detainee
“It’s just horrible to live in detention, you know, you just want to give up on everything,” he said.
Favi overstayed a 2013 visitor visa and was in the process of applying for a green card, which his wife, a US citizen, sponsored. During a court hearing for a previous financial crime he pled guilty to, immigration officials arrested him.
He spent 10 months in a county jail, 60 miles south of Chicago. He was released in 2020, right as the coronavirus pandemic began to spread inside that facility.
Favi is now living in Indianapolis, Indiana, and continues to advocate for detained immigrants.
For him, detention — privatized or not — is the same.
“So, I really wish the Biden administration can break the whole system down, you know, detention for profit, you know, private detention, county jail.”
For now, immigrants like Favi and those working to dismantle the detention system altogether will wait to see how — and when — Biden might change it.
This Latina landed a seat on the powerful San Diego County Board of Supervisors — a first for her community
Feb 05, 2021
It was a rare rainy morning in National City, California, just a few miles north of the border between the United States and Mexico.
Nora Vargas, a Planned Parenthood executive and community college board member, was going door-to-door trying to do something no Latina had done before — win a seat on the powerful San Diego County Board of Supervisors.
For over two decades, the five-person board has been filled exclusively by white people, and, until just recently, was entirely Republican in a county that’s begun to swing hard toward Democrats.
“Happy Sunday from National City!” Vargas said to her phone, from underneath a rain jacket. “It’s actually raining a lot, but we’re here to knock on doors.”
Her board district is overwhelmingly Latino and filled with immigrants. But demographics aren’t destiny — and Vargas squared off against seven other candidates, including the area’s state senator. She had to work for every vote.
“Folks in the community would say, ‘We’re going to give you a chance, but we’re going to be watching you. Because politicians come here, they ask us for things, but they never come back.’ That’s the piece that’s really important. We have to deliver for our communities.”
Nora Vargas, vice chair of the San Diego County Board of Supervisors
“Folks in the community would say, ‘We’re going to give you a chance, but we’re going to be watching you. Because politicians come here, they ask us for things, but they never come back.’ That’s the piece that’s really important. We have to deliver for our communities,” Vargas said.
Vargas squeaked into the top-two general election by a margin of 800 votes. Eight months after that, she won a commanding victory — becoming the first immigrant, the first Latina, and the first Democrat to represent her district.
Now, a month after taking office, Vargas is the vice chair of the San Diego County Board of Supervisors, constantly shuffling between press conferences regarding the coronavirus vaccine rollout, and lengthy meetings trying to appropriate federal relief funds. It’s exhausting, but even deep into the evening, she’s still radiating energy as she speaks about it.
“I still wake up every morning thinking, ‘Wow, I get to be a supervisor,” she said.
Vargas was born in Tijuana. Her mother was a US citizen, and her father was a Mexican citizen, something that’s pretty common in the cross-border megalopolis of San Diego and Tijuana.
Going back and forth between two nations is where she believes her political journey began.
“I think when I realized that I was in a very unique state because I was able to cross the border, that’s when it hit me,” she said. “[I thought] ‘What can I do to make the world better for other people, who don’t have the life experience and privilege I have?’ I think that politics was an avenue for me to do that.”
For Latinas in San Diego, there wasn’t much of a roadmap to political power. Local political offices were handed out by powerful party machines, not leaving much of a path for young people looking to get involved in politics.
“To be a Mexicana, a Latina, and then later on, what my friends would say, an honorary Chicana, I really count my blessings where going away for college was encouraged. I needed to see the world. I needed to learn,” Vargas said.
Watching her own mother work in local nonprofits, and her grandmother run a cross-border business, she realized that they were “unintentional feminists.” She brought their perspectives to a Jesuit university in San Francisco, where people with far more wealth and far less diverse life experiences were trying to figure out what was best for immigrant and low-income communities.
“Having those conversations about what feminism was and what women’s rights were had me trying to figure out what does that mean to communities of color, for people who don’t have access or opportunities.”
Nora Vargas, vice chair of the San Diego County Board of Supervisors
“Having those conversations about what feminism was and what women’s rights were had me trying to figure out what does that mean to communities of color, for people who don’t have access or opportunities,” she said.
Vargas found a place to organize and center her work at Planned Parenthood where she eventually became an executive.
“I was a patient at Planned Parenthood, and in my household, no one talked about sex or sexuality or reproductive health care,” she said. “There’s a lot of myths, and in the Latino community, there’s a taboo about speaking about sexuality. It was eye-opening for me that these services were available for young women.”
Access to health care was a fundamental part of Vargas’ campaign. The county’s board of supervisors has the power to build new hospitals, curb pollution and direct millions of dollars to better health outcomes.
But in San Diego, for decades, that board has not reflected the diversity of the border region.
“Particularly since the ’90s, the board definitely had a complexion,” explained University of San Diego politics professor Carl Luna. “It was white and Republican. There was gender diversity, but that was it.”
In many places in the country, local governments like a city council or town board would hold considerable power over local spending. But in California, the county board of supervisors holds the money bags. And the San Diego County Board of Supervisors is sitting on a vast amount of funding from state and local taxes.
“Seldom anywhere in America do five people have so much power,” Luna said.
In the recent past, the San Diego County Board of Supervisors’ Republican majority has built up a huge reserve of funds, adhering to more conservative values of government. While not entirely in step with all the priorities of the Trump administration (especially when it came to the environment), the board voted in early 2018 to support the Trump administration’s lawsuit against the state of California’s “sanctuary policies” for immigrants.
That began to change in November 2018, when the first Democrat in decades, Nathan Fletcher, won a seat on the board. He pushed the other supervisors in a more progressive direction, including funding a shelter for asylum-seekers who had just crossed the border.
But Fletcher, now the board’s chairman, recognizes that the board needs to lean heavier on Vargas than on some other members, given the diversity of life experience she brings to the board. The rest of the board remains white.
Vargas was immediately put in charge of the county’s vaccine distribution efforts to the Latino community.
“Nora Vargas, the burden she faces is she has to work harder to give voice and perspective to the community she represents. Because that community has never had representation at the same level.”
Nathan Fletcher, chairman, San Diego County Board of Supervisors
“Nora Vargas, the burden she faces is she has to work harder to give voice and perspective to the community she represents. Because that community has never had representation at the same level,” Fletcher said.
Vargas believes that reaching the community in ways they’ll not only understand but also trust, is the key to ending the pandemic in Latino border communities, which have been devastated by COVID-19.
“I’m talking and I can just code-switch like that,” Vargas explained, switching into Spanish. “And I did it today, and we were talking about environmental justice and I switched because language shouldn’t be a barrier. After the press conference, I started getting texts from people saying like, ‘Thank you for doing that,’ and that it meant the world to them. But it’s who I am, it’s my community and I want them to understand that they’re being heard.”
Latinas, in particular, are leading the way into political office in the state and the country, says Dr. Inez González, who runs MANA De San Diego, a national organization helping Latinas get involved in public service.
“People want to make a difference, but people need to know where the power is,” said González. “There’s certain boards, like the water district board, that people don’t pay attention to.”
Right now, in the same district that Vargas represents, Latinas are the mayors of National City and Chula Vista. But important positions all over the county are up for grabs if there’s a structure for Latinas to succeed.
MANA De San Diego pushed Vargas to join her first nonprofit board, and they want young Latinas, who turned out in November’s election, to start running for office now — and not wait for seats to open up.
For Vargas, that’s the most important part of her journey. She’s hired several young community organizers to work for her.
“I really want to make sure it’s not as hard as it was for me. My commitment is to try to make sure that the system is really shaken so that the opportunities are there for women and communities of color to rise,” Vargas said.
She hopes that after her, San Diego County politics will never be the same.
Like many therapists, Lu Rocha uses breathing techniques, meditation and yoga in her practice, but she also asks clients about their personal beliefs: “What stories have you heard about in your own family, your own community, what did they do for healing?”
Some tell her that they pray with a rosary. Others, from parts of Latin America, say their grandmothers used to rub an egg on their bodies to ease headaches. They believe the egg absorbs negative energy. Rocha gets it — her parents are from Mexico. She also gets what many of her clients have faced — years of the Trump administration’s tough immigration policies.
“…[T]hese past four years is trauma just about every week. And my people are tired, my people are sick, my people are dying.”
Lu Rocha, therapist, Chicago
“When I was 5 or 6 years old, I walked around with my birth certificate because raids always happened and pickups with the immigration always happened,” said Rocha, who lives in Chicago. “But this is different this time; these past four years is trauma just about every week. And my people are tired, my people are sick, my people are dying.”
Rocha is a member of the Latinx Therapists Action Network, which now has a presence in 20 US states. To take part, therapists must be committed to supporting immigrant communities and the movements allied with them.
Deportations, family separation and detention have long taken a toll on the mental health of many immigrants in the US, along with the advocates who defend them. But the pandemic and uncertainty about immigration policies have magnified inequalities that were already present for marginalized communities, compounding their trauma.
Rocha has seen this firsthand over the past four years but especially leading up to the 2020 presidential election.
“I had DACA [Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals] recipients and we were creating safety plans,” said Rocha who specializes in trauma, serving communities of color and immigrants.
She also had pregnant clients who were undocumented and fearful that if they were to get deported, there wouldn’t be anyone to care for their children.
Therapy can be too expensive for uninsured undocumented immigrants — that’s why some of the therapists in the nationwide network offer sliding-scale fees regardless of immigration status. Historically, these services are not easy to come by for uninsured patients, and especially for those who are undocumented immigrants with very limited options.
Before the pandemic, 93% of Latinos who suffered from mental illness or substance abuse were not getting treatment, according to the latest survey from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
Francisca Porchas is the founder of the Latinx Therapist Action Network. Her work was inspired by the experiences of activists advocating in immigrant communities and the emotional toll that it took on them.Courtesy of Puente
Francisca Porchas, a longtime immigration rights activist, created the therapists’ network in 2019. Porchas’ fight against deportation and immigration detention with groups like the Puente movement in Phoenix exposed her to a lot of trauma, and she realized that suffering affected activists, too. But there weren’t any healing support networks.
“I’m an organizer. I know how to bring people together,” she said about her idea. “And so I want to bring healers, therapists, different types of folks together to really support and bring the kind of resources to the community that’s needed,” she said.
Over two years, Porchas got 84 therapists to join the network. It took time to find therapists who are, in some cases, immigrants themselves and might understand what it is like for someone to experience deportation.
For Porchas, healing is political and when therapists stand up against homophobia, racism and discrimination, it makes a difference. Without that understanding, there’s a risk that someone who needs help might give up. That almost happened to Rey Wences, 29, a human rights organizer in Chicago. Wences didn’t feel understood by therapists in the past. “I had to do a lot of background explaining the context of immigration law. Spending that time talking about immigration policy and just like demystifying some of the misconceptions that this therapist had,” Wences said.
Listen to a version of this story in Spanish here.
Wences heard about the Latinx Therapists Action Network through Porchas and found a therapist who stuck because of shared values.
The network is also working to expand its reach online through workshops. Recently, they held a Facebook Live event with therapist Brenda Gándara, hoping to connect with Spanish speakers. Gándara spoke about anxiety and provided grounding techniques to some of the participants. A few wrote in the comments section online that they had experienced anxiety and stress, and others asked for techniques to help teenagers facing it. Over 500 people have viewed the Facebook session.
This past summer, the therapists got a request from Siembra, an immigrant rights group in North Carolina, that said its community was overwhelmed with grief, fueled by the pandemic, job losses, evictions and anxiety about immigration enforcement.
Sandra, 40, who had to quit her restaurant job to care for her children now at home for school, connected with the network through a workshop organized for Siembra. Sandra, originally from Mexico, asked to use her first name only because she’s undocumented.
“If I go to the store and the police pull me over and I get deported? And I’m jobless. So many things, the stress became unbearable.”
“If I go to the store and the police pull me over and I get deported? And I’m jobless. So many things, the stress became unbearable,” she said in an interview in Spanish.
Sandra got depressed when the pandemic started, and she felt anger toward her four children. Because she lives in a rural area, she couldn’t find a Spanish-speaking therapist who understood her culture and circumstances.
Through the Latinx network, she attended a workshop and learned breathing techniques. A therapist also described her anxiety in a manner no one had before, using words she understood. She was also reminded of more traditional ways to heal, like connecting with her ancestors. Sandra liked that suggestion. Now, every few weeks, she pours herself a cup of tea, and talks to her deceased grandmother and mom, as if they were at the table with her.
“With that cup of tea, I can have long conversations with them, even if they’re not here,” she said. They still exist in her mind and they’ll never leave her, she said. “They are my respite, my connection and my peace,” she said.
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