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Immigrant advocates are “frontline workers” responding to the crisis of dehumanization of migrants. Advocates are exposed to stories of extreme trauma, as they support migrating people navigate U.S. immigration enforcement systems, recounting the worst days of their lives in order to get status, safety, and to meet their needs. Immigration policy and scarce resources limit and frustrate advocates’ work. Prior research reports high rates of worker burn-out, secondary traumatic stress (STS), nightmares, panic attacks, anxiety, and feelings of helplessness. Many leave their advocacy roles after a short time to preserve their wellbeing. However, advocates also identify factors that support their ability to continue on. This study explores how immigration advocates’ motivation for their work and connection to supportive communities serves as a protective factor and sustains their wellbeing in personally, professionally and politically difficult circumstances.
Methods:
The study uses qualitative critical ethnographic methods to investigate immigration court, collecting data through observation, interviews and artifacts given by court-culture actors. Approximately 100 hours of court observation across four different immigration courts in the state of Arizona were completed over 8 months. Approximately 70 interviews with court-culture and court-adjacent professionals were completed. Participants are retired judges, interpreters, retired detention center staff, pro and low-bono attorneys, retired ICE trial attorneys, expert clinical evaluators, country conditions witnesses, legal representatives, social workers, and community activists. Human rights and intersectional feminist frames guided data analysis.
Results:
Although the majority of interviewees described experiencing burnout, STS, or vicarious trauma, their motivations directly connected to factors that they reported sustained and centered them in their advocacy. Participants identified three major motivations for their commitments: a desire to support justice and human rights, their personal faith, and their own familial connections as immigrants or children of immigrants themselves. Participants identified various ways that they combatted stress, despair and the mental health impacts of the work. Many stated they felt like they were achieving meaningful justice and affirming their clients’ human rights. They also reported the nourishing support of their faith communities and professional collaborations, which strengthened them. They also noted feeling like they were echoing the roles of those who helped their own families when they were navigating immigrant-hostile systems.
Conclusions & Implications:
The impetus which brings many advocates to their roles can also guide and sustain them in this difficult work. Connecting advocates to supportive communities within and beyond the legal profession, and undoing the isolation of the legal sphere helps sustain ongoing advocacy. Social workers that are part of legal teams serve a vital role in identifying burnout and trauma, helping their legal colleagues feel less alone, and supporting each other’s’ longevity in this vital work. Greater attention should be paid to the needs of frontline workers and those for whom they advocate, including scrutiny of dehumanizing immigration policies and the hostile, traumatic and retraumatizing enforcement process. Future research should codify social work’s roles in sustaining advocacy and resisting re-traumatization, and extend the evaluation of stress and burnout to social workers in this arena.