Immigration is the lifeblood of this country. The roughly 48 million foreign-born residents of the United States are vital members of this country — indeed, our status as the top destination for international migrants is uniquely advantageous. For example, the developed world is increasingly facing a population age crisis. A cursory glance at median ages across the world demonstrates this, especially in Japan, which sits among the 10 oldest populations in the world, rapidly barelling towards demographic disaster.. Over one in 10 Japanese residents are 80 years old or older, resulting in a declining workforce and plummeting birth rates. The U.S. has no such issues or fears of such issues. The difference between the two? While Japan has consistently enforced draconian immigration restrictions, the U.S. has taken in more immigrants than any other nation.
There are two main delusions that motivate xenophobia. The most common is simple racism, which needs very little attention to dismiss. There is no existential risk attached to this country becoming less white, no matter what “Great Replacement” conspiracists say. Racists have often disguised bigotry with concerns about “migrant crime.” The implicit assumption when they disingenuously exploit tragedies like the murder of Laken Riley or make up stories about Haitians eating pets in Springfield, IL, is that (non-white) immigrants are essentially predisposed to committing crimes, and that they come here to murder and rape innocent (white) citizens. Reality disagrees. Research shows that immigrants are 60% less likely to become incarcerated than native-born Americans, and undocumented immigrants in Texas are 37.1% less likely to have criminal convictions. Every reputable study reaches the conclusion that immigrants commit fewer crimes per capita. This racist delusion that immigrants are criminals must be wiped clean.
The other central delusion behind nativism in this country is the equally (but less explicitly) racist argument that the undocumented immigrants are a public burden. There are two prongs to this: that undocumented immigrants are stealing jobs from hard-working true Americans, and that undocumented immigrants steal jobs from hard-working “real” Americans. These are, of course, completely contradictory positions, which is enough to dismiss them outright, but both can be defeated separately. The first prong of delusion is easier to dismiss: in 2019, 96.7% of Mexican undocumented immigrants held jobs. They are crucial components of American agriculture and construction, and contributed (conservatively) $9.8 billion in federal, state, and local taxes, as well as $14.5 billion to Social Security and Medicare, from which they don’t even receive benefits — a consequence of their undocumented status. A study published in 2016 found that undocumented immigrants contribute about $11.64 billion in taxes a year, an effective rate of 8% — meanwhile, the top 1% of Americans only pay 5.4%. These contributions are about on par with those of the average American citizen.
These statistics might seem to support the second prong. They don’t. As previously mentioned, undocumented labor is crucial in the agriculture and construction sectors of the economy. This stems from immigrants’ willingness to work jobs native-born Americans won’t. These jobs are labor-intensive, dangerous, and pay very little —often below the federal minimum wage. It is ridiculous to suggest that the average American is waiting in line for these jobs. A frequent defense from the anti-immigrant side concedes this and lampoons pro-immigrant perspectives for wanting an underclass of vulnerable, exploitable workers. This is easily countered by the fact that pro-immigrant advocates do push for better working conditions and pay for these workers through legal residency and a path to citizenship, and often push for those same material gains for all American workers. In fact, it is the wealthy perpetrators of anti-immigrant sentiment that want cheap labor. The crucial component one must understand about contemporary xenophobia is that the goal was never mass deportations. Deporting all roughly 13 million undocumented Americans is a logistical impossibility, even if the party of “small government” wastes tax money on more ICE goons. The importance of undocumented labor in the American economy, as well as the incomprehensible burden of the task itself, are insurmountable. But we have to understand that the point of these orders is the threat, rather than the actual deportations. Trump plans on tearing some undocumented Americans from their homes and families to ship them to concentration camps in El Salvador or Guantánamo Bay, and scare the rest into complacent, easily exploitable silence.
ICE is the federal government’s gang of Brownshirts. It serves exclusively to intimidate the undocumented class into accepting dangerous and low-paying jobs. Its existence is a waste of our nation’s taxes and a burden upon our moral character. They were born out of post-9/11 hysteria, and were a useless appendage of the federal government even then. Their other functions as an agency were performed by other federal agencies before 2003, and can simply be performed again by those agencies. The sole unique objective of ICE is to spread terror and cruelty in order to keep immigrants, who are just as American and human as we are, in line. Such an agency should not exist.
The nightmare of full deportation has no chance of realization. But it is still our responsibility to stand up for our most vulnerable compatriots in the coming years and protect them from senseless cruelty. There are ways to resist ICE’s tyranny, using what little remains of the rule of law in this country. Trump’s “Border Czar” Tom Homan demonstrated this recently, lumbering his way onto Fox News to wheeze and whine about Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez teaching members of her constituency how to exercise their rights as residents of the United States. Her efforts to “slow down” the process are clearly working as intended. So long as the institutional safeguards of the Constitution hold, ICE can only achieve its goals if Americans don’t know their rights. The simple act of being educated hinders the government’s extrajudicial authority. Protect your neighbors. Know your rights.
