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How Mass Immigration Hurts Black Americans
CHANGE IT UP
The Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) has an obligation to its base—which
means taking a different approach than most Democrats to the migrant crisis.

Roger House
Roger House
Updated Jan. 07, 2024 3:38AM EST / Published Jan. 06, 2024 11:02PM EST
OPINION Photograph of mass migrants at the US/Mexico border
John Moore/Getty

Immigration is among the most wrenching political questions of the 2024
election. Yet, when Congress resumes debate on border security in
January, the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) has an obligation to act
on behalf of its base. That’s because the Black community is
disproportionately impacted by the current policy on immigration—and the
unpredictable border surges of “asylum seekers.”

To date, the body of 60 members—three Senate Democrats, 55 voting House
Democrats and two non-voting—has been missing in action. The skirting of
duty is largely the result of being beholden to campaign money, business
support, and Hispanic and progressive factions of the party. Now is the
time for the dereliction to stop.

CBC members must shed their reticence and shine a spotlight on the mean
correlation between the rising levels of immigration and the declining
fortunes of Black workers, particularly men.

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For example, the authors of “Immigration and the Economic Status of
African-American Men,” a 2010 study published in the journal Economia,
concluded, “We find a strong correlation between immigration, black
wages, black employment rates, and black incarceration rates. As
immigrants disproportionately increased the supply of workers in a
particular skill group, the wage of black workers in that group fell,
the employment rate declined, and the incarceration rate rose.”

In the years since, the surge of economic immigration has eroded the
standing of Black labor even more. It caused T. Willard Fair, President
and CEO of the Urban League of Greater Miami, to write an op-ed in The
Philadelphia Tribune where he questioned the pernicious loyalty of the
CBC to the Democratic Party’s immigration policy:

“The lasting effects of uncontrolled, mass immigration on Black
Americans are plainly obvious and have been well-documented throughout
our country’s history,” he lamented in the March 2022 commentary. “So
how can any Black politician in good conscience advocate for a more
expansive immigration policy that would continue to do us harm?”

Clearly, the CBC has a duty to protect the interests of the over 18
million Black Americans it represents, even if it cuts against the grain
of the party. No doubt this is a tricky subject for Black Democrats
because many take pride in a legacy of supporting non-discriminatory
immigration policy. The 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act, which
opened doors for legal immigration from Asia and Eastern and Southern
Europe, is among such civil rights accomplishments.

In addition, the CBC has expressed solidarity with the plight of
immigrants as “people of color,” even though immigrants from
predominantly Black countries account for about 575,000 of the estimated
11 million immigrants in the country illegally.

Photographs of migrants being dropped off in New York City
Dozens of migrant families are seen arriving from Texas at the Port
Authority Bus Terminal in New York City early September 6, 2023.

Luiz C. Ribeiro for NY Daily News via Getty
When Congress returns, the CBC must herald how their people are under
duress from the helter-skelter border crossings, unclear enforcement
policies, red state busing of asylum seekers to blue state sanctuary
cities, unpredictable competition for jobs and housing, and lack of
progress on immigration reform.

“CBC members must shed their reticence and shine a spotlight on the mean
correlation between the rising levels of immigration and the declining
fortunes of Black workers, particularly men.”
It means acknowledging the failure of the Biden administration to secure
the border—but helping it to find a way forward. To start, it would be
prudent to untangle the meaning of popular terms used by the press to
describe the border dynamics. For example, most people on the border are
permanent economic immigrants. As such, they are not “migrants” in the
normal understanding of the word and should not be treated as such.

The term “migrants'' typically refers to a mass movement of workers
within a country, such as the westward migrations of white farmers known
as “Okies” during the Great Depression, or the relocation of Black
sharecroppers to the urban factories during the world wars. Such is not
the case for the economically distressed populations passing through
Mexico, Central America, Venezuela, Cuba, and Haiti, as described by
Project Hope, a non-governmental organization that assists health care
workers with crises.

Rather than seeking political asylum, most are seeking to take advantage
of legal loopholes to bypass the normal immigration process. They freely
express a desire for access to work, housing, and permanent residency.
They speak of wanting to take care of their families, even as their
shortcuts threaten to torpedo American workers.

‘Taking from Peter to Feed Paul’
America’s history of favorable treatment for immigrants is a window on
the status of race and labor in our culture. Black American workers have
been diminished by pro-immigration policies ever since slave labor built
the country into an economic powerhouse. For example, America used
preferential land and labor enticements to recruit European immigrants
in the mid-19th century.

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The CBC would be prudent to link the security of Black labor to the best
practices recommended for border security and immigration reform;
namely, gaining control of the border, reducing illegal economic
immigration, shutting down the red state busing activity, and
establishing legal pathways to meet the demands of business for workers.

First, the CBC should push for inclusive standards for Black labor in
skilled industries that attract disproportionate concentrations of
immigrant workers. It might propose language that mirrors President
Biden’s March 2022 executive order 14005 stating that the “Future is
Made in All of America by All of America’s Workers.”

The CBC might offer similar language in the upcoming debates on
immigration legislation—specifically, to prioritize the hiring and
training of underrepresented American workers in civil construction. It
would reinforce the equity provisions established by Congress in the
infrastructure and clean energy laws.

The construction and manufacturing industries will receive a jump-start
from the $500 billion Inflation Reduction Act, the $1.2 trillion
Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, and complementary investments
from private companies. It will pay to reconstruct highways, bridges and
tunnels, weatherize public buildings, install electric charging
stations, construct electric battery plants and electric vehicle
factories, and develop wind and solar power plants.

The projects will require the hiring and training of thousands of
skilled workers, many without college degrees. Yet, Black labor
historically has been excluded in civil construction. Today, as a
consequence, the racial demographic in the construction industry is 60
percent white, 30 percent Hispanic, and 5 percent Black American,
according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

In addition, sanctuary cities like New York are receiving large
allocations of federal infrastructure funds. The city’s construction
industry employed 374,000 people in 2020—and 53 percent were immigrants.
By contrast, the unemployment rate of Black male workers was higher than
any other ethnic group.

Second, the CBC should propose that sanctuary cities seeking bailouts
from Washington be required to give the local population first dibs on
facilities and services. The failure of authorities in such cities to
prioritize their native underserved populations creates a dynamic of
“taking from Peter to feed Paul” that is abhorrent.

Congress should require sanctuary cities to prioritize the local
population for provisions such as homeless shelters, affordable housing
units, emergency room and mental health services, education outreach,
legal services, and food programs, among others. The populations from
the border should have access to older facilities, if room is available.

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Third, the CBC should call on the Biden administration to raise seed
money for a reparations fund with the same urgency it has done for
immigrants. Harris is campaigning on her success in raising $4 billion
to help migrating immigrants in Central America. Why not utilize her
fundraising prowess towards a development bank for the descendants of
slavery and Jim Crow?