As Trump touts mass deportations, California must boost immigration protection programs
With the threat of a Trump re-election, Gov. Gavin Newsom must use this opportunity to maintain funding for immigration protection programs. California's Governor, Gavin Newsom, has proposed cuts to immigration legal services programs in his May Revision of the state budget, including programs that serve unaccompanied youth and undocumented students and families. These programs have been instrumental in providing immigrants access to legal services and pathways to education, inclusion and workforce development. The proposal includes a 75% reduction in funding to the California State University Immigration Legal Services Project and a $10 million cut to the Temporary Protected Status Immigration Services Program. The proposed budget also eliminates the Children Holistic Immigration Representation Project, a vital program that provides legal representation and supportive services to hundreds of children in deportation proceedings. These cuts have sparked outrage among California's immigrant community.
Pubblicato : 3 settimane fa di in Politics
It is often said that the budget is a reflection of our state’s priorities, and throughout the last decade, California has led the nation with programs meant to pave the way not only for immigrant success, but for a stronger California. These investments are designed to provide immigrants access to legal services and pathways to education, inclusion and workforce development.
Despite their myriad benefits, Gov. Gavin Newsom has now doubled down on devastating cuts to these programs in his May Revision of the state budget, including programs that serve unaccompanied youth and undocumented students and families.
While Newsom and the legislature grapple with the state’s fiscal challenges, yet another challenge is looming for California’s immigrant community: The potential reelection of Donald Trump, who has threatened the “largest domestic deportation operation in American history.”
In 2015, California created the first state-based program in the U.S. to provide funding to nonprofit organizations providing legal services to immigrants. This investment provided a pathway to legal status for thousands of Californians, including many in mixed-status households who, because of a lack of access to legal services, did not know they were eligible to become permanent residents or citizens.
By giving immigrants a pathway to residency, the state provided economic mobility to individuals who now had the right to work — providing social and economic stability to individuals who no longer feared family separation through deportation.
These investments made California safer, building infrastructure for legal services in underserved areas of our state that were previously legal deserts and where immigration enforcement has been most rampant, and generating more than they cost in the form of state and local taxes and other economic benefits.
By 2019, the state had expanded its annual funding for legal services to $45 million, recognizing the serious challenges that immigrants faced under the Trump administration’s policies that had destroyed due process, criminalized immigrants and separated families. It’s worth remembering that Trump used the threat of nationwide immigration enforcement raids in an attempt to force Congress to do his bidding in 2019.
The trauma inflicted by the Trump administration against immigrants runs deep and remains a focal point of fear and anxiety about the future.
That is why Newsom’s proposal to cut immigration legal services has triggered outrage in California’s immigrant community. The governor’s proposal includes a $5.2 million cut — or a 75% reduction in funding — to the California State University Immigration Legal Services Project, which provides services to students at the nation’s largest public university system, as well as a $10 million cut to the Temporary Protected Status Immigration Services Program, which would eliminate the program entirely despite California being one of the states with the highest number of TPS recipients.
The governor’s proposed budget also eliminates the Children Holistic Immigration Representation Project, a vital program that has provided legal representation and supportive services to hundreds of children in deportation proceedings across California and has served as a nationwide model for how to humanely welcome immigrant children.
The decision to defund and, in some cases, end programs that support students, undocumented youth, unaccompanied children and those with temporary protections sends the wrong message to Californians and to the nation. It underscores the fact that many politicians believe they can take support from communities of color for granted, keeping these groups out of sight and out of mind until another crisis unfolds. Then, immigrant communities will yet again be forced to rebuild the very programs that are on the chopping block today.
That is not sound public policy, and it is not the way California should treat immigrant communities.
Immigration legal services are a lifeline for one of the most vulnerable and important populations in our state. Elected representatives can honor migrant workers and speak about the importance of diversity, equity and inclusion, but the true test of their commitment is how they treat them in the most challenging times.
Temi: Social Issues, Immigration