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Magdalena and her family made it through Hurricane Harvey intact, but the storm has devastated her family’s already meager finances.
Before the storm, Magdalena — who asked to be identified only by her first name because she is an undocumented immigrant from El Salvador living in the U. S. illegally — and her household of seven were barely subsisting on the povertylevel wages her sister and brotherinlaw bring home from their jobs at a factory and a meatpacking plant.
Then Harvey lashed the Texas coast and flooded one of the rooms in their squat two- bedroom apartment in southeast Houston. Even worse for her family, the storm meant no work for her sister and brother- in- law and a week less of much- needed wages.
Compounding the pain, Magdalena’s daughter and her daughter’s partner and their three children’s apartment was destroyed. Magdalena’s two- bedroom, one bathroom apartment now sleeps 12.
“At least we have our health,” said Magdalena, who cares for her sister and brother- in- law’s children and two of her grandchildren, in an interview.
“I have to have hope that God will get us through this.”
The Houston region is still reeling from Harvey, which has left at least 44 dead and tens of billions of dollars in property damage in its wake.
Among the most vulnerable in a region on the mend are Houston’s estimated 575,000 undocumented immigrants, the third- largest population of unauthorized immigrants in the United States.
Ahead of Harvey making landfall on the Texas coast on Aug. 25,
U. S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U. S. Customs and Border Protection agencies announced that “routine non- criminal immigration enforcement operations” would not be conducted at evacuation sites, shelters or food banks.
But many undocumented immigrants in Houston in difficult situations such as Magdalena’s are wary of reaching out for government help because of the immigration stances staked out by President Trump, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and other politicians seeking to crack down on entry of unauthorized immigrants, immigration advocates say.
The struggle for recovery in Houston is playing out as Trump is expected to announce in the coming days that he will end a controversial program that protects nearly 800,000 young undocumented immigrants from deportation.
On the state level, a federal judge on Wednesday granted a preliminary injunction of Senate Bill 4, legislation backed by Texas’ Republican governor that seeks to outlaw “sanctuary cities,” municipalities that refuse to enforce certain federal immigration laws.
In the aftermath of Harvey, immigrant advocate groups have canvassed lower- income areas of southeast Houston to see how they’re doing.
They’ve repeatedly heard from undocumented immigrants — as well as other low- wage workers in those neighborhoods— who were concerned about falling behind on rent and other bills because of missed work caused by Harvey, said Zakary Rodriguez, an organizer with the-Houston- based housing and immigrant advocacy group El Pueblo Primero.
Many of Houston’s undocumented immigrants work in low- paying jobs in the service, construction and manufacturing industries, carving out a hand tomouth existence in which they are making just enough to pay for rent, utilities and groceries through hourly wages.
Some reported they already have faced threats from landlords warning that they would move to evict them if they didn’t pay rents on time, Rodriguez said.
“It is very difficult for the undocumented to raise their voice, especially with the current political climate,” Rodriguez said.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency already has approved more than $ 114 million in assistance to 161,000 survivors of Harvey.
Undocumented residents, however, are not eligible to make a claim with FEMA for cash assistance the agency distributes to victims of natural disasters who lost work because of the catastrophe. FEMA also distributes up to two months of rental assistance to occupants of homes made uninhabitable in the natural disasters but requires that at least one U. S. citizen or legal resident reside at the dwelling.
In Magdalena’s case, there are two legal residents in her household eligible to receive financial assistance for lost wages from FEMA. But “they worry that the government will use FEMA aid to help them conduct a government roundup,” Rodriguez said.
Carmen Zapata, 64, sought advice from Rodriguez for her niece and her niece’s husband who are living in the U. S. illegally and confronting a deadline Wednesday to pay the rent.
Her niece’s husband worked for six years in Houston for a company that services air conditioners. He lost that job in 2009 when his employer discovered that he could not legally work in the U. S.
Since then, he has cobbled together enough cash- paying odd jobs to have allowed the family to stay afloat.
Last month, Zapata’s niece pawned her jewelry and made plans to look for work with someone willing to hire an undocumented immigrant once her youngest child was to start school in August — a start now delayed until next Monday.
Her niece’s husband also landed an off- the- books painting gig that was to begin in August. But then Harvey struck.