What is the dominant narrative surrounding immigration? and where does it come from?
The Trump administration exaggerated the effects of immigrants coming to American to follow the "American Dream." The effect of the accusations Donald Trump and his administration made resulted in a drastic increase of Americans believing the false truth that immigrants were stealing jobs from Americans and ruining the economy, all while bringing drugs across the border with them. This Washington Post article details in a timeline the false accusations Trump made during his campaign time, before taking office in 2016. He accuses illegal immigrants of never obtaining legal citizenship papers, being criminals and rapists, stealing American jobs, ruining the economy, and bringing drugs with them into America.
What is the counter narrative surrounding immigration? Why is it important?
One counter narrative about illegal immigration is that immigrants actually help the American economy. According to a study by Madeline Zavodny, an economics professor at Agnes Scott College, "every additional 100 foreign-born workers in science and technology fields is associated with 262 additional jobs for U.S. natives." It is also statistically true that immigrants do a very good job at assimilating into American culture, with almost all children of immigrants speaking fluent english. Trump also called immigrants criminals, but according to other studies and findings, immigrants are much less likely to end up in prison or mental hospitals than native-born Americans. Finally, Trump accused immigrants of ruining the economy in the U.S., but according to the Congressional Budget Office, illegal immigrants "on the path to citizenship... produce a surplus of $25 billion" in taxes. (Source)
Where do we see the dominant narrative in the United States? Where do we see the counter narrative?
The dominant narrative is widespread throughout the U.S. and is not limited strictly to members of one political party or another; however, in general people who describe themselves as Conservative, and right-leaning news sources tend to espouse this dominant narrative more often than liberal or left-leaning people/news sources. This dominant narrative is very abundant in the Trump administration, as Donald Trump’s platform for election in 2016 relied heavily on the issue of immigration and a promise to both secure the border and deal with the millions of illegal immigrants already in the United States.
Linked here is an article from 2016 that discusses the hardline stance that Trump took to get elected. In this article you can see evidence of this dominant narrative; the author writes that “[Trump] blamed President Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton directly for violence perpetrated by illegal immigrants.” In this article Trump is also quoted as touting the idea that “uncontrolled, low-skilled immigration...continues to reduce jobs and wages for American workers.”
Much like the dominant narrative, the counter narrative is also not tied solely to one political party or ideology. However, similarly to the dominant narrative, the counter narrative is more prevalent with liberal-identified people as well as left-leaning news sources.
Linked here is a PBS article that breaks down 4 myths about illegal immigration and the economy.
Why is this dominant narrative dangerous to the lives of immigrants?
The effects of this dominant narrative have resulted in immigrant children being separated from their families. Because of this separation many immigrants and their families face negative psychosocial effects since the act of the family separation is usually "not by choice and often occurs suddenly and unexpectedly, with little preparation or planning." Also, because organizations like the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) actually abruptly take immigrants from their homes and places of work for deportation, many immigrants return back to their home countries, which are typically "extremely dangerous and often turbulent environments." Researchers at the Migration Project, also found "numerous cases where deportations resulted in harm, including kidnapping, torture, rape, and murder." In many cases, individuals immigrating to the U.S. do so because to escape danger in their home countries, therefore it is not unreasonable to find that many immigrants being forcibly returned to their home countries would face these negative effects.
Reference: American Journal of Community Psychology. Statement on the Effects of Deportation and Forced Separation on Immigrants, their Families, and Communities. Sep2018, Vol. 62 Issue 1/2, p3, 10p