(Im)migration Movements & the Law

"A new book by the Pulitzer Prize-winning writer about the twenty-first-century Latino experience and identity"--;"Latino" is the most open-ended and loosely defined of the major race categories in the United States. Our Migrant Souls: A Meditation on Race and the Meanings and Myths of "Latino" assembles the Pulitzer Prize winner Hector Tobar's personal experiences as the son of Guatemalan immigrants and the stories told to him by his Latinx students to offer a spirited rebuke to racist ideas about Latino people. Our Migrant Souls decodes the meaning of "Latino" as a racial and ethnic identity in the modern United States, and seeks to give voice to the angst and anger of young Latino people who have seen Latinidad transformed into hateful tropes about "illegals" and have faced insults, harassment, and division based on white insecurities and economic exploitation.

"Immigration presented a constitutional and political problem in the nineteenth-century United States. Until the 1870s, the federal government played only a very limited role in regulating immigration. The states controlled mobility within and across their borders and set their own rules for community membership. This book demonstrates how the existence, abolition, and legacies of slavery shaped immigration policy as it moved from the local to the national level. Throughout the antebellum era, defenders of slavery feared that if Congress had power to control immigration, it could also regulate the movement of free black people and perhaps even the interstate slave trade. The Civil War removed the political and constitutional obstacles to a national immigration policy. Admission remained the norm for European immigrants until the 1920s, but Chinese immigrants fell into a different category. Starting in the 1870s, the federal government excluded Chinese laborers, deploying techniques of registration, punishment, and deportation first used against free black people in the antebellum South. To justify these measures, the Supreme Court ruled that authority over immigration was inherent in national sovereignty and required no constitutional justification. The federal government continues to control admissions and exclusions today, while the states play a double-edged role in regulating immigrants' lives, depending on their politics and location. Some monitor and punish immigrants; others offer sanctuary and refuse to act as agents of federal law enforcement. By examining the history of immigration in a slaveholding republic, this book reveals the tangled origins of border control, incarceration, deportation, and ongoing tensions between local and federal authority in the United States"--

The United States entered a new era with the end of the pandemic-era Title 42 expulsions policy. The government’s hopes of maintaining order at the U.S.-Mexico border post-Title 42 may be complicated by factors including authorities’ limited capacity, ongoing litigation, and cooperation from other countries. This article reviews the Biden administration's changing border policies and possible challenges ahead.

The death in Border Patrol custody of an 8-year-old Panamanian girl is the second child migrant fatality in two weeks under government supervision, raising questions about how prepared authorities are to address medical emergencies of people arriving after an often-exhausting journey. A rush to the border before pandemic-related asylum limits known as Title 42 expired fueled a sharp increase of people in custody. The growing presence of families and unaccompanied children over the last decade presents authorities with enormous responsibilities for medical care. At least six children died in custody during a roughly year-long period from 2018 to 2019.

The film, about migrants going missing in rural Texas, was co-directed by adjunct instructor Lisa Molomot and edited by associate professor Jacob Bricca. It won a Peabody Award in the documentary

El objetivo del CIAM es brindar las 24 horas del día una respuesta humana, profesional y oportuna a las necesidades de nuestros connacion...

The Biden administration is making plans to send an additional 1,500 active-duty troops to the US-Mexico border in anticipation of an influx of migrants when the Title 42 public health authority expires next week, sources familiar with the planning told CNN.

A U.S. homeland security adviser spent Tuesday meeting with Mexico’s president and other top officials, emerging with a five-point plan.

We created a rigorous empirical account of laws protecting the human rights of all migrants and the cross-national implementation that helps them flourish.Now you can explore it.

Recently, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) settled charges of national origin discrimination and retaliation against Total...

When we work together, freedom cannot be detained. When we work together, freedom cannot be detained. We have returned to in-person services, with some aspects of our work remaining virtual. Please call (520) 777-5600 or click below for more information. More Info Donate

The United States resettles thousands of refugees worldwide to provide families a safe place to live. The U.S. government works with approved agencies to encourage refugees to become self-reliant in their new American homes. Learn more about the U.S. assistance programs and services to help refugees.

First part of a blog post detailing the history of the Chinese Exclusion Act.

This ACLU research report, No Fighting Chance: ICE's Denial of Access to Counsel in U.S. Immigration Detention Centers, provides the first comprehensive study of the barriers to access to counsel in

I've been in the States for over three months now. This was my third emigration. The first was from Canada to the US when I was little. Then back to Canada, and now back to the US. The Canadian move was easy for me but I had to learn a lot about immigration law to…

The latest stories on the Trump administration's policy to separate immigrant parents from their children at border crossings.

In keeping with our commitment to promoting open and equal access to justice for all, we at the Harris County Robert W. Hainsworth Law Library have assembled a list of online resources to help answer questions regarding the United States immigration process. Some of the resources provided are availa

What do you think?

Border Patrol agents in Arizona have confiscated the turbans of dozens of Sikh men seeking asylum in the US, violating their civil rights and government policies, the ACLU says in a letter calling for an end to the practice.

By Michael McArthur The final day of the 2022 IALL Annual Course opened with an eye-opening review of U.S. immigration law and policy, presented by the founding director of Stanford’s Immigrants’ R…

The Covid-19 pandemic has spotlighted the crisis low wage immigrant and migrant (“im/migrant”) workers face when caught between the century-long collision betwe

DETAINED is an ongoing collaboration among former immigrant detainees, the Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project (FIRRP), and the University of Arizona (UA) that collects and publicly archives the oral histories of asylum seekers formerly incarcerated by immigration authorities in Arizona. The multilingual, open-access archive, hosted by the UA Libraries, maintains a tangible record that counters the vast emergent landscape of the for-profit immigrant detention industry. This community archive is one of the few forums for former detainees to share their experiences, helping to fundamentally shift the historical narrative of immigration to the United States.

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Welcome to the Global Detention Project's blog tracking the latest developments in migration-related detention practices and policies, urgent appeals, and emerging situations across the globe.

The fight for Black women’s equal pay must address race and gender biases that erode Black women’s wages and undermine their ability to thrive.

In this report, poverty rates are summarized by race and Hispanic origin for the United States, each state, and the District of Columbia.

ICE is turning away Arizona lawyers from immigration detention centers if they don’t have their own protective equipment.

Authorities lowered the death toll on Tuesday evening from 40 to 38 following visits to hospitals across Ciudad Juarez, where victims of the fire had been taken.

A monthly podcast featuring Tanzila 'Taz' Ahmed and Zahra Noorkbakhsh about the good and the bad about the American Muslim female experience. But you know, satirically & disturbingly hilarious.

Muslims make up a little over one percent of the U.S. population, but they seem to take up an outsized space in the American imagination. On this episode we explore why that is.