Anchoring work: how Latinx mixed-status families respond to interior immigration enforcement

Abstract

ABSTRACT The contemporary US immigration enforcement system has disproportionately affected Latinx mixed-status families, those whose members have different legal statuses. Scholars have documented the collateral effects, often focusing on the consequences of deportation on families. Building upon this research and the framework of family work, I investigate how families react and mobilise resources during a removal process—a unique context where immigration enforcement heightens the risk of deportation by targeting a family member. Drawing on 31 interviews from 22 Latinx mixed-status families, this study conceptualises how families engage in ‘anchoring work’ defined as strategies these families use during a removal process to respond to the state’s removal process. Anchoring work manifests in three strategies: (1) strategic secrecy, (2) attorney seeking, and (3) legal engagement. This anchoring work served to attempt to anchor the targeted family member to the United States. This research revealed that while immigration enforcement did inflict trauma and violence upon Latinx immigrant families, immediate family members mobilised to bolster one another’s wellbeing and protect their targeted family members from further harm.