Immigration experts: ‘Trump is promoting white supremacy’

Costly, cruel, and chaotic — that’s how three immigration experts characterized the Trump administration’s new policy aimed at removing undocumented immigrants from the United States. The experts argue that the fallout is not limited to the human toll but extends to a massive economic burden: an estimated $26 billion to fund the policy, along with billions more in lost productivity across industries and sectors that rely heavily on immigrant labor.

At a Friday press conference, Nayna Gupta, policy director for the American Immigration Council, outlined the scope and implications of the executive orders signed by President Trump. “The Trump administration has claimed in recent months that it will target ‘criminal immigrants’ but what Trump’s executive orders make clear is that they are outlining immediate action to hurt all immigrants,” said Gupta, who argued that the Trump administration had taken the election as a mandate for “cruelty on immigration.”

Gupta argued that the key to halting these measures lies in members of Congress and elected officials taking a stand against the policies, which she said “are expensive and have absolutely no effect in improving this broken immigration system.” The policy director said that there will be pushback to this anti-immigration measures. “It will be up to other elected officials and organizations like us to be prepared to put forward a vision and solutions that get us to a better place because Americans want something that is effective, efficient, fair and also humane. And that is, in fact, quite doable,” said Gupta.

Stephanie Gee, senior director of U.S. Legal Services at the International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP), addressed the executive order to suspend refugee admissions, set to take effect on Monday.

“We are already seeing immediate and sweeping harms to refugees and their families as a result of this executive order,” she said. “We have heard this week from so many of our clients who are absolutely devastated [...] One of our clients already had his bags packed when he learned that his flight was canceled. After over a decade of waiting for his case to finish processing, he is now again indefinitely stranded, away from his close relatives.” According to Gee, the purpose of these policies is to incite fear.

Karen Tumlin, director of the Justice Action Center, agrees. “The point of the order was to terrorize immigrant communities, and make the message very clear that immigrants are not welcome here.”

In her address, Tumlin highlighted the several legal challenges to Trump’s anti-immigration polices. “The courts are a critical vehicle to stop the damage, but we really need to listen to those being harmed,” she said. “As a litigator, I have learned that attacks on immigrants affect the entire community.”

“What they have done is they’ve tried to equate foreign born with being a criminal and to scare us and to fearmonger based on their racism,” she said. “The value coming out of the Trump is promoting white supremacy, and we have to stay true to our values, which are about the diversity that makes this country beautiful.”

Tumlin highlighted two active lawsuits challenging Trump’s executive orders. The first targets the order expediting the deportation of immigrants unable to prove they have resided in the United States for more than two years. The second challenges the attempt to cancel appointments scheduled through CBP One, a Biden-era application that facilitated asylum seekers’ entry at designated ports of entry.

“President Trump wants us to be afraid, but my clients have taught me time and time again that bravery comes from all corners, and it is infectious,” Tumlin said, who added that her organization intends to file additional lawsuits against Trump’s orders affecting programs like humanitarian parole for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans, as well as measures related to the militarization of the southern border.

Sign up for our weekly newsletter to get more English-language news coverage from EL PAÍS USA Edition