Katrina Pham/Borderless MagazineDespite fears about Trump’s immigration policies, immigrant community leaders gathered in Chicago on Wednesday to call for unity.
Before Donald Trump was elected president for the first time eight years ago, members of Chicago’s immigrant community gathered at Casa Michoacán in Pilsen to watch the 2016 election results unfold.
On Wednesday, immigrant community leaders came together again at the community center to respond to Trump’s defeat of Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential elections.
“I had a sleepless night…and it brought back memories of being in this room in 2016 and knowing at about nine o’clock at night what was going to happen — knowing that Donald Trump was going to be elected President,” said State Sen. Celina Villanueva, D-12. “In 2016, we thought that we were all going to be gone. And we’re still here.”
Leaders from immigrant-serving community organizations and state elected officials spoke at the Wednesday meeting, hosted by the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights.
The meeting included members of Casa Michoacán, United African Organization, Mano a Mano, Coalition for a Better Chinese American Community, PASO West Suburban Action Project and Arab American Family Services.
Though many expressed anxiety and disappointment in Trump’s reelection, they also shared plans to bolster protections for immigrants and refugees in Chicago and Illinois.
Dulce Ortiz, executive director of the Mano a Mano Family Resource Center, said they are launching a response plan immediately. She said the plan involves “know your rights” educational programming for immigrants. Additionally, they will be pushing for further restrictions in data-sharing with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the expansion of immigrant rights at the state and local level, including protecting DACA recipients and expanding healthcare access.
“As leaders of the immigrant rights movements, we are calling for a moment of unity across all oppressed and marginalized people, a moment to continue the resistance, and a moment to protect all of our people,” said Ortiz.
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For his second term, Trump pledged mass deportations, greater restrictions for asylum seekers and limitations on access to citizenship and visas. He also promised to reinstate his Muslim travel ban, which barred immigrants from six Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. in 2017. President Biden later reversed the ban.
“Day one, I will seal the border,” the former president said at a Pennsylvania rally in October. “…and we will begin the largest deportation operation in the history of our country.”
At the gathering, organizers and legislators told the immigrant community and constituents they were ready to fight for immigrant rights and reiterated that Illinois, a longtime Democratic stronghold, is a welcoming and safe space for immigrants.
While Democrat Kamala Harris won in Chicago and Illinois, Trump won the neighboring states of Indiana, Wisconsin, Kentucky, Missouri and Iowa.
Trump’s reelection can be credited to the Biden administration’s failure “to address the root cause of people’s pain,” Rep. Kevin Olickal, D-16, said — alongside the Democratic Party’s lack of immigrant representation, according to State Rep. Norma Hernandez, D-77.
“It’s up to us as legislators to hold our party accountable, and not just here in Illinois, but all across the country who have hired people that don’t look like us to work on national campaigns who don’t understand our communities,” Hernandez said.
State Rep. Abdelnasser Rashid, D-21, said members of the Democratic Party ignored widespread concerns voters had about the rising cost of living, the economy and the war in Gaza.
“Trump’s election was not an accident,” Rashid said. “Those people [members of the Democratic Party] who made those decisions to turn away from us, they elected Donald Trump.”
The Resurrection Project, an immigrant-serving organization based on the Southwest Side, released a statement on Wednesday in response to Trump’s reelection.
“Our resolve will continue to uplift a positive vision of immigrants that reflects the countless ways our communities contribute to the economy and the social fabric of this nation,” said Raul Raymundo, CEO and co-founder of The Resurrection Project.
“We will not be deterred by fearmongering or anti-immigrant rhetoric,” said José Frausto, executive director of the Chicago Workers Collaborative, in TRP’s statement. “Instead, we are doubling down on our commitment to building a more just society that values the hard work, humanity, and dignity of immigrants.”
“We’re ready to stand up and fight back for the next four years,” said Maggie Lugo, executive director of Casa Michoacán.
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