How many immigrants have to die of virus to count?
CHICAGO — A recent wave of COVID-19 infections and deaths has highlighted the brutal cost of being an essential Hispanic worker. Latinos are overwhelmingly overrepresented among people infected with the virus relative to their share of the population, according to Rogelio Sáenz, professor of demography at the University of Texas at San Antonio. Sáenz, who wrote about the issue on the Latino Decisions blog, analyzed data from the 38 states and the District of Columbia that report COVID-19 infection cases and/or deaths for Latinos.
It’s no surprise Latinos have been so hard hit by the virus. “Essential” services these days usually consist of harvesting, preparing, cooking, selling or delivering food, often for companies that don’t offer personal protective equipment, health insurance or paid time off for illness.
Worse, not only are these truly essential workers often toiling without the proper permits and authorizations for cruelly low wages, but they’re seen by many as disposable and definitely-not-important people.
For example, Wisconsin Supreme Court Chief Justice Patience Roggensack ... in response to the example of Brown County and the JBS Packerland meatpacking plant, which saw coronavirus cases soar from about 60 to almost 800, said: “These were due to the meatpacking, though. That’s where Brown County got the flare. It wasn’t just the regular folks . ... ”
Worker advocates, like Voces de la Frontera Director Christine Neumann-Ortiz, told local media many of the meatpacking plant workers are black and Hispanic, making the judge’s statement racist because it implied those workers’ lives were “less worthy” than the lives of others.
Again, that’s not astonishing, because “brown” people, especially immigrants, have been dehumanized for years . ...
Even as jails and prisons across the country make smart decisions about how to lower the size of their populations in ways that will not put communities at risk for crime, immigration enforcement and incarceration continue unabated. And there has been little transparency, oversight or response to inquiries about what is being done to ensure there are no massive COVID outbreaks in these facilities.
Congressman Mark Pocan, D-Wis., spoke about the problem during a Facebook live video hosted by the Community Immigration Law Center of Madison, Wisconsin. Pocan told viewers the Kenosha County Sheriff’s Department moved all Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detainees out as part of its COVID-19 response (and) scattered the 170 men and women to Illinois, Texas and parts unknown rather than releasing them.
“It’s just a disregard for the people they have in custody,” he said. “We know ICE is still very active and not taking COVID-19 into consideration.” ... He spoke as news broke about the first immigrant in ICE detention to die of virus complications.
Just as worker advocates have been predicting for months “essential” workers were at high risk of being infected with COVID-19, so have activists for unauthorized immigrants been saying ongoing immigration crackdowns, presidential bluster and the inhumanity of ICE operations would kill immigrants in detention and put their jailers and caretakers at risk. The dominoes have started to topple. Now, how many dead grocery store clerks, meat plant processors and grocery delivery people who don’t have any real access to preventive equipment or health care have to die to get some relief for workers cut out of federal stimulus packages?
How many detainees and doctors, social workers, pro bono lawyers, prison guards and janitors have to die before ICE, the Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Border Patrol pause incarcerations and gathering of people at high risk?
And how many times do journalists of color have to tell the same story about how black and brown people are being callously thrown at the pandemic virus before people start actually caring?