Felons, not Families”: Criminalized illegality, stigma, and membership of deported “criminal aliens

Heidy Sarabia
Additional contact information
Heidy Sarabia: California State University, Sacramento, United States

Migration Letters, 2018, vol. 15, issue 2, 284-300

Abstract: Since the 1990s, U.S. immigration enforcement has focused on detaining and deporting unauthorized migrants labeled as “criminal aliens,” most of whom (about three-fourths) are Mexican nationals. Yet, little data exist on this population of migrants. Using a transnational lens, and drawing from analysis of government and media, as well as participant observation data collected along the border, this article shows the consequences of the stigmatization and integration of those migrants deported as “criminal aliens,” in both Mexico and the U.S. While the framing of illegality has dominated the literature on unauthorized migrants in the U.S., I argue that the focus on deporting “criminal aliens” marks a shift from “illegalization” to the “criminalization” of immigration enforcement in the U.S. In particular, I highlight how the focus on deporting migrants as “criminal aliens” results in the criminalization of their illegality; that is, Latino non-citizens who are deported become criminalized perpetual outlaws because the label “criminal aliens” is legally permanent, with severe consequences for their identity and membership in both Mexico and the U.S.

Keywords: criminal aliens; crimmigration; deportation; stigma; illegality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.tplondon.com/index.php/ml/article/view/374/367 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mig:journl:v:15:y:2018:i:2:p:284-300

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://migrationletters.com/

Access Statistics for this article

Migration Letters is currently edited by Kittisak Jermsittiparsert

More articles in Migration Letters from Migration Letters
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ML ().