Opinion Journalism could help change the immigration debate in America
Journalists covering the tragedy chose to recount the lives of these lost immigrants. They told of their daily struggles and dreams. They interviewed their grieving relatives.
“If I would have known, I would not have let him go to work. I would have stopped him,” Carlos Suazo Sandoval told CBS reporter Camilo Montoya-Galvez, remembering the last time he saw his brother, Maynor.
“My brother is the engine of this family,” Norma Suazo added.
After decades of living and working in the area, immigrants had become a part of Baltimore.
Workers such as Maynor Suazo Sandoval are also the engine of America’s economy. The immigrant workforce has long been a crucial driver of various industries. For example, without immigrants, the construction industry would grind to a halt. Immigrants work in it at great personal risk.
And yet, immigration is increasingly identified as an issue of concern among American voters.
Last week, as Baltimore grieved, Gallup released a comprehensive report on the issues concerning Americans in this election year. The poll included an open-ended question asking respondents to identify “the most important problem facing the country today.” Twenty-eight percent cited immigration, ranking it above inflation or poverty.
Violent nativist rhetoric has featured prominently in U.S. politics for almost a decade now. In 2015, early in his presidential campaign, Donald Trump labeled Mexicans — who constitute most immigrants, and their descendants, in the United States — as criminals. Since then, he hasn’t let up. On his path to the 2024 election, Trump has stated that immigrants are “poisoning the blood of the country.”
Why has Trump’s ugly demagoguery gained purchase with American voters? In part, it’s because migrants toil in obscurity.
“Our industry doesn’t exist without immigrant labor,” Wisconsin dairy farmer John Rosenow told me when I interviewed him during the Trump administration. “Eighty percent of the milk in Wisconsin is harvested by immigrants. If you took the immigrants away, way over half of the farms would go out of business.”
The thousands of farmworkers who sustain farms such as Rosenow’s, or California’s vast fields, do so quietly, too often overlooked. How many motorists passing by road repair crews truly acknowledge them? It’s all too easy to take them for granted.
The media bears some responsibility. In the United States, stories about the border crisis overshadow those highlighting the essential daily contributions of migrants. These editorial choices have repercussions. If only stories like those of the Baltimore road repair crew and their families had been told earlier, American public opinion might be somewhat different. If immigrants were accorded the recognition and dignity they deserve in America’s national discourse, a demagogue’s job would be much more difficult.
Those of us who have had the privilege of recounting these stories understand their depth and complexity, their humanity and moral significance. There is no better antidote to hatred and misinformation.
But that work needs to start now. If we continue to wait for catastrophic events to spotlight the stories of people like the six grieving Baltimore families, public perception of their struggles and aspirations will remain unchanged. That would be an American tragedy.
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