Founded in 2017 shortly after President Donald Trump’s first term began, The Saratoga Immigration Coalition is a network of civic groups, faith organizations, and individuals who have helped coordinate local resources to refugees and immigrants throughout the southern Adirondacks. Co-coordinator Terance Diggory spoke with WAMC as a rise in anti-immigrant sentiments bolstered by the new Trump administration have been underlined by Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids in New York.
Well, the main mission of the coalition is to support immigrants in the community and to advocate on their behalf and to educate the community about who's with us, who has come from other countries. And so, we've been doing that in a variety of ways. And of course, the particular circumstances dictate the particular strategies that we use at a given time. So, I was just thinking, we just re-launched an emergency fund for immigrants with special needs for, you know, paying the month's rent or having trouble with utility bill for the month, special short-term needs, and we anticipate that those needs will increase with the increased pressure on immigrants coming out of the policies of the federal administration. But the last iteration of that emergency fund was in 2020, 21 because of COVID 19. So that's just an illustration of how different circumstances create different strategies for us.
How have your priorities been reshaped in the past month and a half? Now that we've got somebody new in the White House?
Well, I think we've shifted somewhat from support for social needs to support for legal needs. So, for instance, one of our main priorities right now is just making sure that everybody is informed about what their rights are, and we're cooperating with other service providers in the area to provide Know Your Rights workshops. We distribute Know Your Rights cards to immigrants in the community. And the idea here is simply that all human beings have rights and deserve to be treated with dignity and respect, and immigrants knowing their rights helps to ensure that they will receive that recognition of their dignity and that respect.
We don't know exactly what to predict in our immediate area. We do have a something of a track record, going back to 2017 when it took a couple of months for the immigration enforcement under Trump's first administration to affect the Saratoga area. So, it was really in May through September, when there were a number of detentions in our area for immigration reasons. So, it may be that we have a similar delay. It may be that it will be more piecemeal rather than mass raids—I can't call them exactly mass raids, but there were 35 people who were arrested between May and September in Saratoga in 2017. So, because we don't know what to expect, we have to prepare for a range of possibilities and be flexible in the kind of education that we provide to our immigrant community.
How concerned are you for the next, for the next four years, for the people that you work with?
Well, I'm very concerned with, you know, the lives that are going to be affected, and the range of lives that are going to be affected, because already, it's quite evident that the administration is targeting not just those immigrants who are in the country without status, so-called undocumented immigrants, but immigrants who have come in with legal permission to be in the country and with promises that were made by the US government about how they would be treated, and now those promises are being taken away. So, it's really, I think, an awful breach of contract which is occurring. And you know, I hope that the country will wake up to the fact that these illegal things are being done on behalf of those who are actually responsible for administering the legal system.
What’s one of the more common misconceptions about immigration, about refugees in this part of that world that you guys either have to deal with or re-educate people on at the meetings that you hold every month?
Well, I think the big misconception which has been promoted by Donald Trump in his campaigns and now in his role as President, has been the idea that immigrants are a threat to United States security. I don't think people realize to what extent immigrants are vetted before they come into the country. And this includes people who would fall under Donald Trump's category of ‘illegal immigrants.’ Most, the majority of the undocumented immigrants in this country are people who entered with visas to be here and then simply overstay their visa. They didn't go when their visa, they didn't leave when their visa expired. And that means that in order to get into the country, they were already screened and deemed not a security risk to come in. So, I think the better strategy for dealing with any security threat that might come from immigration is not using this blanket approach of assuming that all immigrants are security threats, but really concentrate on criminal activity that does occur at the border, and, of course, in the interior of the country, and is not simply the responsibility of or caused by immigrant presence.
What do you think will be the next big challenge that you guys are going to have to deal with, whether it's something you've been dealing with, whether it's a new adaptation, that you the Saratoga Immigration Coalition, anybody else who wants to support what you do, what are you guys going to have to do in the next couple of years to really support the people that you are aiming to help out?
I think the challenge is in the numbers. I mean, it comes up with Donald Trump's talk about mass deportation, and that word mass is the operative term here that the number of immigrants who are affected now by federal policies, who are under threat of removal from this country has increased dramatically. So, I know that that certainly is true for the startup Immigration Coalition, but for all service providers who are working with immigrants, they simply feel overwhelmed by the number of requests that they get. So having to scale up is the big challenge.
