By Roger House | Word In Black
(WIB) – Immigration is among the most wrenching political questions of the 2024 election. Yet, as Congress debates border security, the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) has an obligation to act on behalf of its base. That’s because the Black community is disproportionately impacted by the current policy on immigration.
To date, the body of 60 members — three Senate Democrats, 55 voting House Democrats, and two non-voting — has been missing in action. Now is the time for the dereliction to stop. CBC members must shed their reticence and shine a spotlight on the mean correlation between the rising levels of immigration and the declining fortunes of Black workers, particularly men.
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For example, the authors of “Immigration and the Economic Status of African-American Men,” a 2010 study published in the journal Economia, concluded, “We find a strong correlation between immigration, black wages, black employment rates, and black incarceration rates. As immigrants disproportionately increased the supply of workers in a particular skill group, the wage of black workers in that group fell, the employment rate declined, and the incarceration rate rose.”
In the same year, the U.S. Civil Rights Commission concluded that sufficient evidence existed to show a correlation between illegal immigration and the depression of Black wages, employment, and factors like housing and public resources.
The CBC has a duty to protect the interests of the over 18 million Black Americans it represents.
In September 2023, Steven Camarota, director of research for the Center for Immigration Studies, told a House committee that expansive immigration harms the most marginalized American workers. He argued that advocates who point to low employment as a sign of too few workers can be mistaken.
“This ignores the dramatic long-term decline in labor force participation, particularly among working-age, less-educated, U.S.-born men,” he wrote. “Those not in the labor force do not show up as unemployed because they are not actively looking for work.”
The Disenfranchisement of Black Labor
Some economists have promoted an “education and skills deficit” argument for the status of Black labor. However, this argument has been challenged in studies that question the models used. It notes that Black workers with education and skills also encounter wage and employment obstacles because of employer bias, but many economists tend to overlook this reality, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
No doubt there are reasons beyond immigration for the plight of Black labor — such as recessions, automation, factory outsourcing overseas, and employer bias — but Black labor undeniably fared better in the 1960s and 1970s before challenges to affirmative action policies and the surge of foreign workers that began in the 1980s. And unlike the other factors, immigration is one that the federal government can control.
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In a 2022 commentary, an evidently exasperated T. Willard Fair, president and CEO of the Urban League of Greater Miami, questioned the support of the Congressional Black Caucus for the Democratic Party’s immigration policy:
“The lasting effects of uncontrolled, mass immigration on Black Americans are plainly obvious and have been well-documented throughout our country’s history. So how can any Black politician in good conscience advocate for a more expansive immigration policy that would continue to do us harm?”
The CBC has a duty to protect the interests of the over 18 million Black Americans it represents, even if it cuts against the grain of the party. The CBC has expressed solidarity with the plight of immigrants as “people of color,” but immigrants from predominantly Black countries account for only 575,000 of the estimated 11 million immigrants in the country illegally.
Border Security and Asylum
As Congress debates border security, the CBC must herald how their communities are under duress from the helter-skelter border crossings, unclear enforcement policies, red state busing of asylum seekers to blue state sanctuary cities, unpredictable competition for jobs and housing, and lack of progress on immigration reform.
It means acknowledging the failure of the Biden administration to secure the border — but helping it to find a way forward. I don’t presume to be an expert on immigration policies, but there seem to be common sense measures to which the administration and Democrats seem willfully tone-deaf.
These include tightening eligibility for asylum; rejecting migrants who pass through safe countries to reach the border; reducing economic pressure on countries of origin such as Venezuela and Cuba; shifting priorities from family sponsorship to real business need; rejecting migrants who endanger children to gain access at the border; expanding the number of border police; mandating E-verify for hires, with fines for violations; and reducing the H-1B visa program.
Most immediately, the CBC must not support any effort to give work permits to the hundreds of thousands of border migrants in the cities. It will result in a huge pool of cheap workers competing with Black labor in certain occupations.
“Taking from Peter to Feed Paul”
America’s history of favorable treatment for immigrants is a window on the status of race and labor in our culture. Black American workers have been diminished by pro-immigration policies ever since slave labor built the country into an economic powerhouse. For example, America used preferential land and labor enticements to recruit European immigrants in the mid-19th century.
In Chicago, a group of Black Democrats learned that some things never change. They are seeking to hold Democrats to account as the city greets new arrivals with resources like health screenings and rent support. One concerned resident said, “They’re giving migrants all the things we’ve been asking for since we came here in chains.”
What Should the CBC Do?
First, the CBC should push for inclusive standards for Black labor in skilled industries that attract disproportionate concentrations of immigrant workers. It might propose language that mirrors President Biden’s March 2022 executive order 14005 stating that the “Future is Made in All of America by All of America’s Workers.”
The CBC might offer similar language in the upcoming debates on immigration legislation — specifically, to prioritize the hiring and training of underrepresented American workers in civil construction. It would reinforce the equity provisions established by Congress in the infrastructure and clean energy laws.
The construction and manufacturing industries will receive a jump-start from the $500 billion Inflation Reduction Act, the $1.2 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, and complementary investments from private companies. It will pay to reconstruct highways, bridges, and tunnels, weatherize public buildings, install electric charging stations, construct electric battery plants and electric vehicle factories, and develop wind and solar power plants.
The projects will require the hiring and training of many thousands of skilled workers, many without college degrees. Yet, Black labor historically has been excluded in civil construction. Today, as a consequence, the racial demographic in the construction industry is 60% white, 30% Hispanic, and 5% Black American, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
In addition, sanctuary cities like New York are receiving large allocations of federal infrastructure funds. The city’s construction industry employed 374,000 people in 2020 — and 53 percent were immigrants. By contrast, the unemployment rate of Black male workers was higher than any other ethnic group.
Second, the CBC should propose that sanctuary cities seeking bailouts from Washington be required to give the local population first dibs on facilities and services. The failure of authorities in such cities to prioritize their native underserved populations creates a dynamic of “taking from Peter to feed Paul” that is abhorrent.
Congress should require sanctuary cities to prioritize the local population for provisions such as homeless shelters, affordable housing units, emergency room and mental health services, education outreach, legal services, and food programs, among others.
Third, the CBC should call on the Biden administration to raise seed money for a reparations fund with the same urgency it has done for immigrants. Harris is campaigning on her success in raising $4 billion to help migrating immigrants in Central America. Why not utilize her fundraising prowess towards a development bank for the descendants of slavery and Jim Crow?
Finally, the CBC should demand that immigrants be required to learn about America’s struggle against racism and colorism. The colorism system of subtle discrimination based on fair complexions can be deeply rooted in the culture and practices of people from countries with colonial pasts. Black Americans should not be expected to endure the petty slights of color hierarchy with every new surge of immigration.
In closing, the CBC has an urgent responsibility to defend the needs of Black Americans — and particularly labor — in the pending debates on border security and immigration reform. The question is whether it has the political will?
Roger House is associate professor of American Studies at Emerson College and the author of “Blue Smoke: The Recorded Journey of Big Bill Broonzy” and “South End Shout: Boston’s Forgotten Music Scene in the Jazz Age.” His forthcoming book is “Five Hundred Years of Black Self Governance” by Louisiana State University Press. A version of the commentary was featured in The Daily Beast.