Anchoring work: how Latinx mixed-status families respond to interior immigration enforcement

ABSTRACT

The contemporary US immigration enforcement system has disproportionately affected Latinx mixed-status families, those whose members have different legal statuses. Scholars have documented the collateral effects, often focusing on the consequences of deportation on families. Building upon this research and the framework of family work, I investigate how families react and mobilise resources during a removal process—a unique context where immigration enforcement heightens the risk of deportation by targeting a family member. Drawing on 31 interviews from 22 Latinx mixed-status families, this study conceptualises how families engage in ‘anchoring work’ defined as strategies these families use during a removal process to respond to the state’s removal process. Anchoring work manifests in three strategies: (1) strategic secrecy, (2) attorney seeking, and (3) legal engagement. This anchoring work served to attempt to anchor the targeted family member to the United States. This research revealed that while immigration enforcement did inflict trauma and violence upon Latinx immigrant families, immediate family members mobilised to bolster one another’s wellbeing and protect their targeted family members from further harm.

KEYWORDS:

• Immigration
• latinx
• families
• removals

Acknowledgements

The author wishes to thank Jody Agius Vallejo, Emily Smith-Greenaway, Vanessa Delgado, Mary Ippolito, Ann Owens, Latoya Council, and Karina Santellano for their helpful comments on earlier drafts. This work is supported by the Ford Foundation, the National Science Foundation [DGE-1842487], and the Latino Center for Leadership Development at Southern Methodist University.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 The government does not provide attorneys as is in the case with the criminal legal system. Individuals facing immigration court can retain the services of an attorney or represent themselves. Given that in the immigration context, a civil area of law, attorneys are not provided, the onus instead falls upon individuals to secure this resource (Eagly and Shafer 2015).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Ford Foundation; National Science Foundation: [Grant Number DGE-1842487]; Latino Center for Leadership Development at Southern Methodist University.