Return to sender? A comparative analysis of immigrant communities in ‘attrition through enforcement’ destinations

Abstract

Drawing on surveys from two Mexican immigrant sending communities, this paper comparatively examines the link between subnational policy structures in US destinations and immigrants' settlement and residency behaviour. It focuses in particular on attrition through enforcement policy at the local and state level that is formed to trigger the voluntary exit of undesirable immigrants. With a twofold comparison of immigrants in three cities and two states, the analysis indicates that immigrants do not alter the duration of time they spend in receiving locales or change their state of residence due to restrictive subnational policies. Rather, economic and social factors more prominently shape immigrants' settlement and residency patterns. The implications of this analysis are discussed with particular attention to the incorporation process for immigrants who remain in destinations with attrition through enforcement policy.

Keywords:

• unauthorized immigration
• attrition through enforcement
• subnational immigration policy
• receiving communities
• settlement
• incorporation

Acknowledgements

The author would like to acknowledge the helpful comments of David FitzGerald, April Linton, Jeff Haydu, John Skrentny and two anonymous reviewers.

Notes

1. Subnational immigration policies are not limited to the USA. See Penninx et al. (2004), Alexander (2007) and García (2007) for European cases and Tsuda (2006) for Japan.

2. For notable exceptions, see Koopmans (2004), Alexander (2007) and Filindra, Garcia Coll and Blanding (2011).

3. No exhaustive compilation of contemporary local immigration policy exists, although growth likely parallels or exceeds that at the state level.

4. The MMFRP is a programme of the University of California San Diego's Center for Comparative Immigration Studies. Surveying occurred during the sending communities’ annual festivities, when many migrants return home. Researchers also identified respondents in US destinations through snowball sampling with multiple points of entry (see Cornelius 1982). This data collection approach captures the immigration experiences of entire sending communities. There is no sampling and no sampling error.

5. Anaheim Council minutes (19 September 1995).

6. Anaheim Council minutes (3 October 1995, 7 November 1995). Congressional Record 142-H2378 (Daily edition 19 March 1996), Congressional Record 142-S4017 (Daily edition 24 April 1996).

7. House of Representatives’ House Report 105–338 (23 October 1997).

8. Officers in Anaheim's jail are with ICE, which replaced the INS in 2003. They are present on a part-time basis (Anaheim Public Information Officer, personal interview, 21 March 2011).

9. Anaheim Union High School District Resolution No. 1999/2000-BOT-01.

10. Inglewood Public Information Officer, personal interview, 9 February 2011.

11. Los Angeles Council Resolution 12 June 2007; Sturgeon v. Bratton (2009) 174 Cal.App.4th 1407.

12. In 2006, the town of Oologah passed an ordinance restricting unauthorized immigrant employment and Tulsa enacted a resolution condemning city contractors’ hiring of unauthorized migrants (Oklahoma Political News Service 2006; Lassek 2010).

13. The three employment provisions came under preliminary injunction in 2008; two were overturned in 2010 (Boczkiewicz 2010).

14. Nevertheless, only Tulsa has a 287(g) partnership in Oklahoma (ICE 2011a).

15. In addition to Proposition 187 of 1994, in 1996 Proposition 209 eliminated affirmative action in the admission processes of public institutions, and Proposition 227 of 1998 banned bilingual education programmes in public schools.

16. The sample is time restricted to reflect only respondents whose last trip north was in 1995 (when Anaheim's restrictions began) or later. To capture settlement in Anaheim, Inglewood or Los Angeles, it also reflects immigrants who remained in these destinations during their last trip.

17. A regression with two dichotomous variables representing Anaheim and Inglewood that leaves Los Angeles as the reference category yields results similar to those reported in Table 4: across all models, neither the Anaheim nor the Inglewood variable is significant, indicating that restrictive policies do not curtail immigrant settlement.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Angela S. García

ANGELA S. GARCÍA is a PhD candidate in the Department of Sociology at the University of California, San Diego.