This summary was featured in Documented’s Early Arrival newsletter. You can subscribe to receive it in your inbox three times per week here.
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday reinvigorated the federal government’s efforts to deport Ravi Ragbir, an immigrant advocate who runs the New Sanctuary Coalition. Ragbir has been fighting his deportation with a First Amendment claim, saying the federal government targeted him for exercising his freedom of speech. A federal appeals court had previously ruled in his favor, saying the arrest was retaliatory, but the Supreme Court vacated that decision and sent it back to a lower court. Law 360
In other local immigration news…
Muslim Families Continue to Struggle Due to Travel Ban
Sfuaun Ali, 29, has been waiting for three years to hear back from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) about the status of the I-130 form he submitted for his wife to join him in New York. After getting married in 2014, Ali returned to New York to finish his bachelor’s degree in international business while his wife stayed in Egypt as the war in Yemen worsened. Ali is among many Yemeni-Americans who have been impacted by the consequences of President Donald Trump’s travel ban on immigrants from a list of Muslim majority countries. The ban was issued in Trump’s first week as president and has gone through many iterations. But in his first term, it has impacted the lives of thousands of Americans hoping their loved ones could join them. Read more at Documented
Study Shows There’s No Link Between Crime and Undocumented Immigration
There is no link between undocumented immigration and crime, according to a new study released by the University of Buffalo. Researchers used two estimates of undocumented immigration to determine that that population had no direct effect on crime rates in 154 U.S. metropolitan areas, including cities like Chicago, Las Vegas and New York City. “Even after estimating the undocumented immigrant population in U.S. metropolitan areas in two different ways, we found that undocumented immigrants had no significant effect on violent crime and actually had a significant negative effect on property crime,” says Robert Adelman, an associate professor of sociology in UB’s College of Arts and Sciences. WGRZ
Documented Nominated for Four National Awards
Last year, Documented began distributing a newsletter in Spanish via WhatsApp called Documented Semanal. Many of the subscribers to the newsletter are undocumented Spanish speakers in New York City. This year, in response to the pandemic, Documented created resources to help the community find critical aid, such as food or rental relief, and answered questions readers had about coronavirus relief. Now all the Spanish articles published on our site are in response to questions from our WhatsApp community. In recognition of this work, Documented is a finalist for the LION Awards for Best Coverage of Underserved Communities and Technology Innovation of the Year, along with the Online Journalism Award Gather Award in Engaged Journalism. Read more at Documented
Support the work of Documented
Documented was founded with the goal of making sure the people affected by our stories were also the people reading them. Immigration reporting is often extractive and isn’t produced or published with the main protagonists as the intended audience. Through our reporting and out outreach via WhatsApp, we’ve created award-winning journalism that is created with and for New York’s immigrant communities. This work is not easy and it is not cheap. Consider becoming a member today to help fuel this work. By joining the Documented Community, you can not help only provide us with the financial freedom needed to fulfill our mission but also meet others who are passionate about immigration in the New York area. Become a member today.
