Fear and Deportation: The Emotional Politics of Immigration Enforcement

• In Event: Beyond Deportability: Expanding Migration Illegality and Deportation Research

Abstract

What do physical and verbal abuses have in common with official programs to incarcerate, and deport unauthorized migrants? Drawing on a new data set, this paper examines how these myriad facets of the migratory experience induce fear and worry upon return to Mexico. By analyzing the relationship between factors such as physical abuse, and the official programs that make up the United States Border Patrol’s (USBP) strategic plan – “the Consequence Delivery System,” this paper examines the emotional politics of immigration enforcement. I argue that this approach hinges upon provoking an emotional response from deportees. The USBP has moved past the often studied “Gatekeeper Era,” into a new, more sophisticated model for immigration enforcement, one that combines official programs (such as Operation Streamline) with systemic abuses in one complete strategy aimed at creating greater fear and anxiety, in the hopes that people will not return. By connecting the migration literature to geographical understandings of affect it allows us to understand the production of fear, not as a by-product of enforcement, but central to the mission of USBP. This opens new avenues for discussing the mechanisms of enforcement employed along the border and how to explain the persistence of systemic violence (official and unofficial) committed against undocumented migrants.

Author

• Jeremy Slack, University of Texas, El Paso