The Reign of Terror Against Immigrants Must End

When Donald Trump first ran for President, he promised to deport all 11 million undocumented immigrants, claiming he would start by targeting "criminals" who were "stealing jobs from U.S. citizens." Others have long echoed the narrative that immigrants are unfairly flooding the country due to "open borders."

These claims are dangerous myths.

Meanwhile, the price tag for this cruelty is staggering. While vital local programs for healthcare, childcare, food security, environmental and workplace safety protections remain chronically underfunded, the budget for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) which oversees Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has ballooned to over $80 billion.

The racist theory driving this reign of terror by Trump is the “Great Replacement Theory” that, though unproven, is a divide and conquer strategy that claims people of color want to replace white people in all aspects of the country’s life. The administration heavily restricts immigration from majority non-white nations while leaving majority white countries largely unaffected.

In the case of South Africa, Trump invites white South Africans to come emigrate to the U.S. because of the false charges that Black South Africans are killing white farmers. In fact, it is both Black and white farmers who have been killed over land disputes.

While Latinos still comprise the vast majority of those held in detention during Trump’s second term, the enforcement surge has rapidly expanded to other communities. Nationally, the number of Black Africans detained and deported has tripled, while in New York City, the number of detained individuals of Asian descent has grown sevenfold.

A record of illegality and cruelty

Look no further than Delaney Hall in Newark, New Jersey, where hundreds have been unlawfully detained. Many were transferred there after being rounded up without charges straight out of federal courtrooms in New York City.

The detainments were later ruled illegal by a federal court. The conditions inside are notoriously inhumane; first-hand accounts from the detainees themselves paint a grim picture of their treatment. Readers can access letters from detainees describing their conditions by going to the website: lahuelga.com/SOS.

This isn't an isolated incident. NewsNation recently reported that judges have ruled ICE agents illegally detained at least 4,421 immigrants.

Even more alarming are the lethal consequences of this unchecked authority, such as the tragic ICE enforcement actions in Minneapolis that resulted in the deaths of protesters. Video evidence even showed a legal firearm being stripped from a protester moments before they were beaten and shot.

Local investigations into these deaths have been actively hampered by federal authorities.

People residing here legally on work visas are taxpayers with clean records and have been dragged from their cars in front of their terrified families. Once inside holding cells, they face psychological torture: overcrowded, standing-room-only conditions with lights kept on 24 hours a day for days on end.

Some detainees are even denied life-saving medications until they agree to sign self-deportation paperwork. Thousands are left to languish in these cells for up to a year without a single hearing or trial.

The economic toll on our communities

While ICE wages this aggressive campaign, local businesses and government services are left to suffer because of it. According to data from FWD.us, undocumented immigrants paid $96.7 billion in federal, state, and local taxes in 2022 alone—averaging roughly $9,000 per person.

The vast majority of this, $59.4 billion, goes directly to the federal government. Yet, they are entirely ineligible for nearly all the social safety net programs they help fund. I know this firsthand from my time representing union workers who manage eligibility for Medicaid and SNAP.

Immigrants pay into a system they are barred from using.

Undocumented residents contributed $25.7 billion into Social Security and $6 billion into Medicare in 2022 according to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP), though are ineligible for benefits. In New York alone, immigrants make up 23 percent of the workforce and taxpayers.

A report by the New York City Comptroller Tom DiNapoli found that immigrant New Yorkers contributed $61 billion in city taxes and commanded $138 billion in spending power, maintaining higher employment rates than U.S.-born citizens.

Filling the jobs Americans won't

The narrative of "stolen jobs" is false. Undocumented and documented immigrants predominantly fill vital gaps in the agricultural, hospitality, service and construction industries.

These are jobs that would otherwise go unfilled. In New York City, they are low-paid homecare workers making up more than half of that essential workforce.

The business community is panicking over the prospect of mass deportations. "They do work that many Americans won’t do,” according to Rachel Blumberg, CEO of the Toby & Leon Cooperman Mount Sinai Residences in Boca Raton, Florida, expressing deep anxiety over losing long-term immigrant staff.

"In more than 40 years in hospital administration, including many years in Human Resources, I can testify to the great support given through the employment of healthcare workers from many nations,” said the executive vice president of Northwell Health strongly advocated for maintaining Temporary Protected Status (TPS).

Land O’Lakes CEO Beth Ford echoed this sentiment, calling immigration "central to the economic health and the growth of our economy and our businesses."

Immigrants contribute roughly 21 percent of the U.S. Gross Domestic Product, a contribution projected to boost the U.S. GDP by $7 trillion over a ten-year period. This according to Jeff Thielman, president and CEO of the International Institute of New England.

Fact-checking the crime and "legal" narratives

To justify these aggressive tactics against immigrants, proponents spin fiction about public safety. Yet, data published by ICE shows that the number of detainees without criminal records has risen dramatically, hovering around 25,000 compared to 15,000 with records.

Furthermore, NBC reports that only 14 percent of undocumented immigrants detained by ICE have criminal records of any kind. Research from the conservative Cato Institute confirms that crime rates among U.S. citizens are twice as high as those of undocumented immigrants.

Finally, we must confront the common refrain: "My ancestors came here legally, so why can't they?" As an Italian American, I hear this frequently from my own community

. But this argument fundamentally misunderstands history.

The concept of an "illegal immigrant" didn't even exist until the late 1920s, when a law was passed classifying those who failed to report illnesses upon entry as illegal. During the peak of Italian immigration between 1900 and 1910, two million people entered the country. My own grandparents arrived before 1900. One of my grandfathers, who helped build the Empire State Building, didn't become a citizen until the mid-1920s.

Before 1924, visas did not exist. To enter the country, a person simply had to show they had modest monetary means or a sponsor and take a physical. There were no rigid tests, quotas or bureaucratic barriers like those engineered today.

The same was true for the Irish who arrived in massive numbers during the Potato Famine of the mid-1800s; they were welcomed without restriction because the country faced a massive labor shortage.

The undocumented immigrants of today are doing exactly what my ancestors did: working hard, building America, and seeking a better life. They are our neighbors, our co-workers and our friends.

This state-sponsored reign of terror against human beings and their families must end! Join in with the AFL-CIO unions, religious and advocacy groups, to fight to make this happen.