Ever since I decided to come to America for college, people have asked me daily whether I am afraid. From implementing harmful policies and spewing blatant, xenophobic rhetoric, the current administration hasn’t given international students a reason not to be.
The U.S. has a rich history of discriminating against immigrants. Trump and his team have made immigration reform a signature issue in their campaigning and policymaking, promising to “Build the Wall” in 2016 and limiting fixed visa stays in 2020. Propagating the reduction of both legal and illegal migration, Trump has gone out of his way to reshape visa, asylum, and immigration policies.
Policies & Bans: How Donald Trump Keeps Us In Check
Trump first vowed in 2015 that he, as President, would build a wall between America and Mexico in order to purge the US of illegal immigrants. In order to divert funding to the cause, he declared a national emergency on the border and created a program called “Remain in Mexico”, which restricts Mexican asylum seekers from gaining refuge in the US. Trump has further established the “safe third country” agreements with Guatemala, Mexico, and Panama, which allows him to send asylum seekers back to those countries.
Additionally, Trump has tried his hardest to harm the eleven million undocumented residents by attempting to rescind various Obama-era executive orders, including the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy which forbade the deportation of DREAMers; people who have lived here most of their lives and whose decision to come to the U.S. was made for them. In 2020, he took the issue to the Supreme Court but was luckily overruled in June with a vote of 5-4, with Roberts writing the opinion about the ruling. The decision outraged Trump, who later called it “politically charged” on his Twitter account, arguing that it will lead to America losing its Second Amendment.
“These horrible & politically charged decisions coming out of the Supreme Court are shotgun blasts into the face of people that are proud to call themselves Republicans or Conservatives. We need more Justices or we will lose our 2nd. Amendment & everything else. Vote Trump 2020!”
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 18, 2020
In 2017, he turned to another marginalized group and instated a Muslim travel ban through executive order. The order was initially rejected by judicial branches, yet later in 2018, the Supreme Court embraced a less rigorous version. This should come as no surprise seeing as Trump, during his 2015 campaign, said he believed that there should be “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.” In January 2020 the Trump administration called for the extension of the 2017 ban, which would allow the US to impose stricter visa restrictions for those seeking permanent residency in the US. This travel ban has affected asylum seekers and international students on a large scale given that many come from Muslim-majority or minority countries like Saudi Arabia, India, Iran, and Nigeria, with 284,420 international students being Muslim in 2014/15.
After the initial extension of the travel ban in January, the administration moved to nullify visas for students who will be attending college solely online due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The administration quickly revoked the policy due to the magnitude of backlash the White House faced — including lawsuits from Harvard, MIT, and 17 states that quickly followed the universities.
Arguably, Trump’s most horrific anti-immigration effort was his 2018 “Zero-tolerance” policy, a decision which led to the largest to date implementation of detention centres and separations of families. The administration said they would instigate the end of family separations after both the public and international outcry followed. Yet two years later, nothing has changed — if anything, the conditions have worsened without showing a sign of positive development anytime soon. Many have taken action to fight for the abolition of the detention system in America, from petition campaigns to the Detention Watch Network, but the administration has somehow rendered supporting immigrants as un-American to its conservative followers.
Trump’s bigotry, exemplified by the multiple racist and xenophobic policies, has encouraged unforgiving behaviour and growing intolerance towards immigrants in this country. This administration has proven time and again that it will do everything in its power to establish an anti-immigrant foreign and domestic policy which will ensure the oppression of millions.
Iva Sopta
Featured image courtesy of Jose M. on Unsplash. Image licence can be found here. No changes were made to this image.