In the year 2015, as Donald Trump presented his speech for the presidential candidacy, he expressed that the US was suffering from illegal immigration. Trump claimed that “When Mexico sends its people; they’re not sending their best… They’re bringing drugs. There are bringing crimes. They’re rapists…” Rumbaut, Dingeman " Robles, 2018). Throughout the campaign, Trump expressed the danger posed by immigrants to the US and the need to eradicate them. He also used this issue to compete against Hillary Clinton who he expressed would bring in 650,000 refugees in the US in her first year in office. Trump went on to promise to construct a wall in the US-Mexico border to ensure that Mexican immigrants would not be allowed to the US. Trump also asserted that the murder rate and crime rate were very high and the main trigger was the illegal immigrants. However, it’s important to note that these ideas are generally falsely aimed at achieving a popular appeal with the people and use the mass media to intimidate the US citizens into believing that drastic action was necessary. The paper will analyse the deportation and criminalization of the Latino immigrants in both the legal and the undocumented scenario.
The political aspect of immigration
One of the main challenges currently being faced is that the news media generally present the negative images of immigrants focusing on their illegality, undocumented status and their connection with criminality (Farris " Silber, 2018). Therefore, immigrants especially the Latino’s are viewed to be low-skilled professionals who are considered as a source of threat to the citizens (Cervantes, Alvord " Menjívar, 2018). The Hart-Cellar Act established1965 changed the immigration laws which was different from the national origin consideration and focused mainly on the aspects of employment and family which covered quotas acceptable from each country (Farris " Silber, 2018). Despite the establishment of the Act, migration continued triggered by the need for low-skilled and less costly labor. Primarily after the year 1965, the documented and undocumented immigration levels rose very sharply, this also introduced the ‘illegal’ classification of immigrants (Welch, 2017).
The US Congress for many decades now has struggled with the immigration laws and trying to decide the solution for over 11 million undocumented immigrants who are in the country. There is the question of whether it would be right to provide them with legal status. The Liberals view legalization as the process of acquiring citizenship centered on economic opportunity and preserving family ties. On the other hand, the conservatives are very keen on aspects of illegal activity and instances of criminality (Cervantes, Alvord " Menjívar, 2018).
Politicians stress on the need for a border wall and intensification of border security. However, the reality is that about 33perecent of the unauthorized immigrants into the US arrived on a legal basis and their undocumented status was mainly due to them overstaying their provision on temporary non-immigrant visas. The evidence available is that from the year 2005, the number of immigrants entering the US without documents has decreased.
Another challenge is that immigrants intensify the feeling of economic threat for the citizens. The problem is that they are mainly presented to be low-wages professionals. Therefore, the media tends to represent immigrants such as the Latino’s as low-wage professionals and ignore their counterparts existing in highly-skilled professions such as medicine. Even though many immigrants are in the lower-skilled job categories, yet the Bureau of Labor provides statistic which indicates that immigrants are in multiple job types. The figures show that 32.2% of the foreign-born people are in management jobs compared to the 40.7% of the native-born US citizens (Rumbaut, Dingeman " Robles, 2018).
The other aspect is that due to their low levels of skills and education, the immigrants compete for small jobs and they do not pose much economic competition. Therefore, the threat aspect is just a threat narrative which is magnified by politicians and the media stereotyping certain immigrants especially the Latinos (Cervantes, Alvord " Menjívar, 2018).
Immigration and crime
In the US, periods characterized by high migration were seen to be followed by nativists caution and perception of threat (Welch, 2017). There was the aspect of stereotypes where the newcomers were regarded to be dangerous posing both social and economic problems. One of the major fears associated with immigrants has been the aspect of crime, and this is a bias witnessed against the Latino immigrants (Welch, 2017). These concerns have been witnessed in the 19th and the 20th centuries, and these were followed by setting up of three major commissions in the US Congress which are spread within a period of 30 years.
The first was the Industrial Commission which commenced operations in the year 1901. In the year 1911 another commission Immigration Commission commonly known as ‘Wickersham’ was established (Rumbaut, Dingeman " Robles, 2018). The third was the Commission on Law Observance which came into effect in the year 1931. All these commissions were tasked with carrying out an investigation into immigration and establishing the different ways in which thy increased crime in the US.
However, the reports of all the three commissions indicated that lower levels of crime engagement were witnessed by immigrants when compared to the native-born US citizens. The Dillingham commission in its report in the year 1911 expressed that, “No satisfactory evidence has been produced to show that immigration has resulted in an increase in crime…” (Rumbaut, Dingeman " Robles, 2018). Therefore, the results indicate that immigrants are less likely to commit crimes when compared to the Native Americans.
On the other hand, the Wickersham Commission investigated the historical perception and public opinion concerning immigration association with criminal activities (Welch, 2017). The commission established that high levels of stereotype were common whereas the existing evidence showed that a lesser rate of crime was associated with immigrants as a whole (Rumbaut, Dingeman " Robles, 2018). The strange aspect is that a decade later, many US citizens still hold the bias and are convinced that immigrants perpetrators of crime.
Criminalization of immigration
The aspect of regarding immigrants as criminals has been in existent for an extended period which has been characterized by immigrant exclusion, aspects of containment and even disposal. The problem started during the colonial era but is well captured by the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act, Palmer Raids in 1920 after the World War 1, Mexican Repatriation when the Great Depression was witnessed and many more (Rumbaut, Dingeman " Robles, 2018).
There has been the case of moral panics by citizens who have resulted in instances of stigmatization and the classification of deportable noncitizens as being illegal and criminals. The media has portrayed them in a false light, and the problem has been followed through by the political pressure. The result has been the establishment of restrictive laws which has criminalized immigration and acted as triggers for mass deportations being witnessed currently (Barboza et al., 2017).
Various laws were established which defined immigration to be criminal. In 1986, the IRCA was established which led to the active registration of 2.7 million people who were undocumented (Rumbaut, Dingeman " Robles, 2018). At the same time, the Attorney General was given the power to deport any non-citizen who was guilty of a criminal offense (Rumbaut, Dingeman " Robles, 2018). There were large sums approved by the budget to intensify border security and employers were now required to duly verify the status of their employees which had not been required prior. In the year 1988, the Anti-abuse Act converted felonies into law. Thus, in a category which had initially been made up of severe violent actions was now inclusive of other minor crimes. In the modern day, any noncitizen found guilty of an offense that can have a sentence of a year or more is regarded as a felon and can be removed from the country and banned for re-entry (Barboza et al., 2017).
Law and order experts together with the media targeted the immigrants who were subjected to many difficulties, especially during the 1990s. Latinos migrants were classified as illegals and criminals who came to the US to take away the American jobs and misused the services of the state (Barboza et al., 2017). They were also said to be dealing with drugs and associated with violence. The result was the militarization of the US borders in various operations such as ‘Hold the Line’ (Rumbaut, Dingeman " Robles, 2018). The US focussed on the south-western border in a bid to prevent illegal migration and trafficking of drugs and also weapons. Entering through the border without documentation became very difficult and resulted in border deaths (Abrego et al., 2017).
The terrorist attacks on the US which occurred on September 11, 2001, acted as a catalyst for political and media agitation for action. The incident triggered the moral panic and also led to a link being drawn between the illegal immigrants and their association with not only a crime but also terrorism (Abrego et al., 2017). The government agencies used surveillance and targeting of migrants mainly the Muslims as means of preventing terrorism. The DHS was enforced in the year 2003and immigration was categorized as a national security issue. Various Muslims were required to register with the NSEERS program. The DHS also rolled out the ‘Endgame’ operation which was tasked with ensuring that undocumented immigrants and terrorist suspects would be deported within ten years (Abrego et al., 2017).
The Obama government was very committed to reforming the immigration laws and practices. Even though the Congress failed to establish the DREAM Act, Obama a implemented the DACA program that was set to protect children of immigrants. The program documented over 800,000 child migrants and work authorizations. The Obama administration also targeted felons for deportation, not families (Barboza et al., 2017).
However, the Obama government was responsible for the removal of over 3 million people which is the highest number witnessed in any previous government in the US. The other point to note is that a majority of the people deported during the time had only been charged for minor non-violent offenses. In fact, in 2014 alone, over 60 percent of the 4141,481 people deported were not guilty of a criminal offense (Rumbaut, Dingeman " Robles, 2018). The statistics show that only 7 percent of the total deportations were based on serious crimes such as assault, sexual crimes and weapon-related incidents (Rumbaut, Dingeman " Robles, 2018).
The trend towards mass criminalization and deportation is a complex system woven around different sectors such as the media, military, criminal surveillance and the prisons. In fact, from the 1990s some lobbyists are driven by corporate interests and shady deals which have had significant investments in ensuring that the immigration industry continues to be more complicated. The budget allocation made for ICE and CBP is now the largest when compared to values allocated to other enforcement agencies in the US (Rumbaut, Dingeman " Robles, 2018). The detention rates have also risen significantly. In the 1980’s about 30 people would be in detention is a day, whereas in 2014 the figure rose to 34,000 which is quite unusual (Rumbaut, Dingeman " Robles, 2018).
During the Reagan government, the government argued that it would be better to set aside private facilities to detain people. The argument was that such an initiative would be less costly (Abrego et al., 2017). The two leading companies which make the highest profits in the prison industry in the US are GEO and the Corrections Corporation of America. These companies have contributed over $10million to political candidates and over $25 million in lobbying. The two companies have continued to grow over time, and in total, they are worth $3.3 billion concerning revenue per year. These companies have lobbied for various anti-immigration Acts such as Senate Bill 1070 and the DHS Appropriations which was passed in 2012 (Ewing, Martinez " Rumbaut, 2015).
Another notable aspect is that in 2016, after Trump emerged victorious in the elections, CCA was the largest gainer in the stock market. The US currently has one an extensive and complex detention infrastructure around the globe with more than 250 county jails. There are communities whose existence is mainly in detention. Therefore the system has its interests and a legal backing (Barboza et al., 2017).
Conclusion
The Latino’s have been primarily targeted for deportation and accused of illegal migration. They have also been linked with criminal activities and trafficking of people, drugs and even weapons. Trump has also established himself as an authoritative figure, and in his efforts to appeal to the masses, he used moral panic and racist means to refer to the immigrants. He also led the white working class population to believe that things were very wrong and there needed to be drastic changes.
Latino and Muslim immigrants have been categorized as a threat to the US security under the Trump’s government. He promised to build a wall between the US and Mexico, thus targeting the Latino’s and moreover to come up with a compelling deportation mechanism which would remove all the undocumented immigrants from the US. These words are very familiar to the Latino’s as they echo the Mexican Repatriation operation which was witnessed in the year 1954. Categorising immigrants as criminals is rapidly expanding.
The injustice against immigrants is tied to other factors such as preventing drug trafficking and safeguarding the US citizens. Whereas it is essential for immigrants to have the right documents and use the right ways to enter the US, yet the criminalization of Latino immigrants is not excusable. There ought to be proper systems to detain and deport individuals, but this should not be by their race or place of origin.
References
Abrego, L., Coleman, M., Martínez, D. E., Menjívar, C., " Slack, J. (2017). Making immigrants into criminals: Legal processes of criminalization in the post-IIRIRA era. J. on Migration " Hum. Sec., 5, 694.
Barboza, G., Dominguez, S., Siller, L., " Montalva, M. (2017). Citizenship, fear and support for the criminalization of immigration: Contextualizing Mexican Americans’ attitudes about the role of law enforcement. Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies " Management, 40(2), 197-213.
Cervantes, A. G., Alvord, D., " Menjívar, C. (2018). 'Bad Hombres': The Effects of Criminalizing Latino Immigrants through Law and Media in the Rural Midwest. Migration Letters, 15(2), 182-196.
Ewing, W. A., Martinez, D., " Rumbaut, R. G. (2015). The criminalization of immigration in the United States.
Farris, E. M., " Silber Mohamed, H. (2018). Picturing immigration: how the media criminalizes immigrants. Politics, Groups, and Identities, 1-11.
Rumbaut, R. G., Dingeman, K., " Robles, A. (2018). Immigration and Crime and the Criminalization of Immigration.
Welch, K. (2016). Middle Eastern terrorist stereotypes and anti-terror policy support: The effect of perceived minority threat. Race and Justice, 6(2), 117-145.
