Tensions between newly arrived migrants and long-established immigrant and minority communities are reaching a fever pitch over the perceived unfair distribution of state benefits.
The frustration, centred in major cities, is twofold: Many undocumented and mixed-status families feel overlooked as new arrivals become eligible for work permits, and in many communities of colour, spending on shelter for asylum seekers is seen in contrast to the scarcity of other social programmes.
“The narrative out there has been somewhat distorted to paint a picture where it looks like new immigrants are living in plush conditions. That’s not the case. They’re living in very difficult conditions,” said New York Assemblyman Adriano Espaillat (D).
The tension is particularly acute in Democratic strongholds like New York and Chicago, where community leaders and elected officials have spent decades organising their constituents with limited success.
“Mixed-status families, people who have lived here for 10, 20, 25, 30 years, who have worked, paid taxes, sent money back to Mexico, obeyed the laws, kept their heads down – who are probably better citizens than most Americans – are frustrated,” said Illinois Representative Jesús “Chuy” García (D).
“Because political leaders, community leaders, religious leaders have told them, ‘If you stand up for yourselves, if you march in the pro-immigration reform events in Chicago and around the country’ – and Chicago was sort of the spark for a lot of this – that something would happen,” García added.
But immigration reform as most communities understand it – access to paperwork to deal with the government – was last enacted in 1986.
What has changed is the pattern of migration to the United States, from demographics to the immigration status of new arrivals. And these two factors are linked: The historic trend of Mexican single adults crossing the border has given way over time to families from other countries with stronger asylum claims.
But by and large, the public does not distinguish between asylum seekers and undocumented immigrants, creating the impression of a two-tier system.
“I go to my district and I walk my district and I meet with people – this is more a result of what they hear on television and what they read in the newspapers, which sometimes creates this tension that is in so many ways more fictional than based on the reality of the communities that we have the migrants coming into,” said Representative Nydia Velázquez (D-N.Y.).
That’s made it harder for new arrivals to assimilate, especially asylum seekers from Latin America.
“I think some of it is xenophobia. I think some of it is disinformation. And it’s driven by insecurity,” says García.
He added that the perception of a migrant threat has dovetailed with concerns about urban violence in Chicago, adding a layer of distrust between communities.
That distrust came to a head on Tuesday in Chicago’s Brighton Park, a predominantly Latino neighbourhood with a large Chinese immigrant population, where the city is building a migrant camp on privately owned land.
Local protesters tried to physically block machinery from entering the site, days after Alderman Julia Ramírez fled another protest that turned violent.
Ramírez hosted a tense town hall meeting on Tuesday night, where the majority of residents spoke in favour of housing the migrants, but many expressed frustration at the city’s lack of transparency in choosing the shelter site and implied that the migrants were a public safety threat.
One resident, a teacher, ceded her time at the microphone to a recent arrival from Colombia, a student of hers identified as Juliet.
“A lot of people think it’s frustrating that new people, new migrants, are coming to this place. I understand that – of course it’s not pleasant to have new people coming to your place and to feel that the place where you live is changing,” said Juliet, adding that sending migrants to hotels is not an option because they are for-profit businesses that do not provide full board.
“People should put themselves in other people’s shoes. We don’t want to spend the winter on the streets. So please don’t hate us for wanting more stability for our people,” said Juliet in Spanish.
García said refugees from other parts of the world receive less media attention and have an easier time assimilating.
“In Chicagoland, we were able to integrate about 30,000 Ukrainian immigrants who came to Chicago, and they did not get as much coverage during that time, much less stories about crime, drugs and prostitution,” he said.
Still, there is growing resentment among communities of colour and low-income communities in general, and the work permit disparity exacerbates those feelings.
“You see it in the black community in Chicago, and now you’re seeing the intensity of anger and hurt in the Mexican community saying, ‘What about us? We’ve been working here for 20 years,’ and some of them are actually being displaced by new migrants coming in with work permits,” said Rebecca Shi, executive director of the American Business Immigration Coalition.
Advocates for long-term undocumented immigrants are calling on the Biden administration to address this disparity by granting immigration parole to large segments of the population, paving the way for them to work legally.
On Wednesday, García and fellow Democratic Reps. Pramila Jayapal (Wash.), Verónica Escobar (Texas) and Delia Ramírez (Ill.) had planned to call on President Biden to grant parole to undocumented or foreign-born spouses of U.S. citizens, but their press conference was interrupted by the vote to elect Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.) as the new speaker.
Undocumented immigrants can’t apply to change their immigration status or be considered for work permits. Immigration parole essentially wipes a person’s immigration record clean, allowing them to apply for papers.
According to lawmakers, 1.7 million US citizens have an undocumented spouse, and 4.9 million US citizen children have at least one undocumented parent.
Although mixed-status families are a priority for many lawmakers, there is also momentum to push for parole for Dreamers and farmworkers, among other groups of undocumented immigrants.
“I have some colleagues I’ve been working with on a letter to the president about parole for mixed-status families. We’re going to urge the White House to do that, but there are a number of different groups of people with different immigration challenges and restrictions,” Escobar said.
But Escobar, who along with Rep. María Elvira Salazar (D-Fla.) is pushing a bipartisan compromise bill on immigration and border security, said parole doesn’t go far enough.
“What frustrates me is that we continue to kick the can down the road on this issue, hoping that someday we will have large enough majorities in the House and the Senate, and control of the White House, and get everything that we Democrats want to help the vulnerable residents in our communities and across the country who deserve legal status.”
Still, advocates see parole as a powerful tool for the Biden administration to calm the waters between different immigrant communities, paired with ongoing measures to expedite work permits for asylum seekers and funding for cities to host them.
A meeting on Wednesday between members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas focused on the budget and how to get more money to cities, not parole, according to Espaillat.
The simmering tension, which Democrats hope to defuse with a combination of funding and work permits, could fuel a political backlash.
Chicago is due to host the Democratic National Convention in August, and Democrats are keen to avoid an escalation of the kind of protests that local officials have endured.
And for many mixed-status communities that vote overwhelmingly Democratic, political inaction could be another factor in suppressing voter turnout.
That’s prompting elected Democrats, most of whom don’t believe a bipartisan solution is within reach, to press the Biden administration for decisive action.
“It’s gotten really tough. Because those of us in elective office have been telling people it’s going to happen, and be patient, and don’t give up, and let’s keep trying. So it gets complicated. And migration is a hemispheric challenge. It’s global,” says García.
“So you try to get people to understand all the forces at work, at play, that create these challenges for us. And you also hope that young people will see the humanity of the new arrivals and help bridge that gap and help create empathy and hope.”
