EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – An El Paso advocacy organization is urging immigrants to become informed and seek legal aid before Donald Trump takes office next January.
That’s because the presumptive president-elect has promised mass deportations that could directly affect thousands of individuals lacking legal immigration status, as well as their U.S. born children, their employers and an economy that has benefited from their labor for decades.
“The most important thing for everyone to be doing right now is to be getting legal advice as soon as possible so they can find out where they stand,” said Melissa Lopez, executive director of Estrella del Paso, an organization previously known as Diocesan Migrant and Refugee Services.
The organization is urging migrants who may have come into the country without permission but have since forged a solid work history or formed families and raised their children here not to panic. They want them to act, instead.
Trump made border security and immigration enforcement a centerpiece of his campaign. The Pew Research Center estimates 11 million undocumented immigrants were living in the U.S. as of 2022. GOP politicians allege the number could be as high as 20 million now.
“It was going bad, and it was going bad fast. We are going to have to seal up those borders and we’re gonna let people come into our county. We want people to come back in but they have to come in legally,” Trump said during his victory speech in the early hours of Wednesday.
The statement echoed campaign rhetoric from his first run at the presidency in 2016, in which he said rapists and criminals were coming across the border illegally and promised to establish a special deportation task force.
His promises on mass deportations fell short during his first mandate, but not for lack of trying.
“We saw firsthand the devasting impact of the first Trump Administration: Numerous attempts to close the border, the dismantling of the refugee system, limits on the due process rights of our clients,” Lopez said. “We are preparing ourselves for another attack on immigrants.”
The leader of the nonprofit said she doubts the federal government has the infrastructure to arrest, hold in detention and speed through immigration courts the massive number of migrants Trump has promised to deport. But an increase will force Estrella del Paso and other advocacy organizations to stretch their resources, especially in legal services to prevent deportations.
“Should we see mass deportations, they would have huge impacts in our economy. There are (undocumented) individuals who work at all levels in our community. You have immigrants in the agricultural fields, in the food industry, in manufacturing,” she said. “For a number of people the economy was one of the driving forces for voting the way that they did. What they don’t understand is that mass deportations would have a negative impact on the economy.”
That’s because deportations of working migrants will create labor shortages and increase the costs of food production and manufacturing, she said.
Lopez and Marisa Limon Garza, executive director of Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center, said their nonprofits will continue to advocate for migrants despite an expected “onslaught” from the executive branch.
“No change in administration or policy will deter us from fighting for immigrants, LGBTQI+ individuals, women, people of color, and everyone who will be impacted by an anti-immigrant agenda. Ours is a culture of resilience,” Limon Garza said.
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