Executive Summary
TOPIC
Estimates suggests that between 2011 and 2013, at least half a million children experienced the deportation of a parent (Capps et al. 2015). While multiple studies document the numerous psychological and economic effects of this aggressive system of immigration enforcement, an understudied area in this literature is how families navigate family life throughout the process of a detention and/or deportation. By doing so, this study recognizes that families perform new roles including advocacy, emotional anchoring, and financial laboring in an attempt to maintain family wellbeing.
RESEARCH QUESTION AND PROBLEM
The disproportionate targeting of Latino working-class families characterizes the current era of mass detention and deportation. However, family life does not stop for the families separated by either borders or detention walls. Hence, this study seeks to understand how Latino families navigate family life. Specifically, this study asks: (1) How do Latino families navigate family life throughout the detention and deportation processes? (2) In what ways do different familial structures navigate family life?
METHOD
This interview-based study utilizes 28 semi-structured, in-depth interviews with individuals who previously experienced the detention or deportation of a parent in their families. This includes interviews with the previously detained/deported parent, current/former partners, and/or minor/adult children. Note, not everyone in each household participated.
SIGNIFICANCE
Latinos are the youngest racial and ethnic group in the US, and as such, their childhood development is intrinsically linked to the nation’s future (Lopez and Radford 2017). Childhood development depends in part on the wellbeing of families. The country’s social and economic future depends on healthy and wellintegrated members of society, and with policies of mass detention and deportation, the US is denying this generation a healthy upbringing, a sense of belonging, and opportunities for socioeconomic mobility.
KEY PRELIMINARY FINDINGS
• Despite the significant challenges during and following a parent’s detention and/or deportation, family members, including children, emerge as active respondents. In part, children’s US citizen status allows them to enter immigration enforcement system as advocates. Others emerged as emotional anchors and financial contributors of the household.
• Both detention and deportation are costly processes that require families to expend their resources, time, and money alongside the stress and the uncertainty that comes with supporting someone in deportation proceedings.
• Experiences of the effects of detention and deportation differ based on family structure. Because family structure often also determines the resources in the home, a deportation of a mother vs. a father resulted in different effects for the family.
• A father’s deportation from a nuclear family generally resulted in the most severe consequences, as fathers were usually the main breadwinners. A mother’s deportation from a nuclear family usually resulted in dual-households, a household in the US and in their country of origin. On the other hand, families with separated parents did not result in economic restructuring.
INNOVATION
This study makes two important innovations to how family life is thought about. First, this study recognizes that family members are active respondents throughout the process of detention and deportation. As such, they take several measures to maintain family well-being. Secondly, this study integrates experiences from multiple familial configurations. While most research has concentrated on the experiences of a deported father from a nuclear family, immigrant families are diverse. Single mother led households represent 30 percent of Latino immigrant households (Menjivar, Abrego, and Schmalzbauer 2016). In addition, there are indications that women are increasingly put into deportation proceedings, representing at least 10 percent of the currently detained population (Rabin 2009).
LIMITATIONS
This study occurred during a specific political time when anti-immigrant rhetoric and policies characterized the federal government. Despite this federal context, most participants lived in California, a region characterized by its embrace of immigrant integration policies. Hence, this study is conducted under a specific time and place.
POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS
• Increase binational services and programs that can support family ties across borders. This would not only help in mitigating the negative effects on children’s lives but also the extensive labor they take up.
• Provide resources as parents and family members are undergoing each step of the procedure. This goes beyond providing legal guidance and includes economic support, transportation support, translation services, building community support, and developing multiple strategies for a holistic advocacy.
• Implement prosecutorial discretion and other procedures allowing for judges to once again consider an immigrant’s family ties and responsibilities prior to making decisions on removal proceedings.
