Responding to SOTU, Borderland Advocacy Organization Delineates State of the Border

EL PASO, TEXAS – Responding to President Biden’s State of the Union address, Marisa Limón Garza, Executive Director of Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center, in El Paso, Texas, and Ciudad Juárez, Mexico and New Mexico, said:

“The state of the border is complex and defies the easy answers and platitudes comprising much of the national conversation. The President speaks of a bipartisan consensus to ‘fix’ the border but ignores the fact that deterrence-based policies have a long history of failing when put into practice. Expanding legal migratory pathways and offering a pathway to citizenship for DACA recipients and other immigrant communities are real and sustainable solutions. Republican leaders speak of ‘invasion’ and threat, all while ignoring how a vibrant and prosperous border drives a vibrant and prosperous America.”

“Both sides emphasize restriction and exclusion while ignoring the real ways that border communities, every day, come together and bring order, safety, and humanity to our immigration system through the work of welcome.  While taking care of vulnerable families presents genuine challenges, so does a growing politics of fear that encourages violence and threatens to undermine our laws and constitution.”

“As the US immigration system becomes increasingly associated with the concept of 'the border,' the needs and experiences of border residents are often overlooked. We require access to fair and dignified work opportunities, affordable healthcare and housing, a sustainable environment, and protection against excessive policing - all of which are neglected in discussions dominated by how to manage immigration.”

“Tonight’s addresses failed to capture those realities, a real missed opportunity.  At the same time, thankfully, the words of politicians stuck inside a beltway bubble do not define the state of the border; the lives of our communities do.  Regardless of the failures of politicians, ordinary people will continue to come together to make our border a place of order, safety, and humanity, to make our communities places of dynamism, discovery, exchange, and prosperity, and to make the state of the border – and the union – better for us all.”