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In Texas, illegal aliens built apartment complexes and high-rise buildings that transformed the skyline. They harvested fruits and vegetables in the fields, cooked them in restaurant kitchens, cleaned hospitals, and started small businesses. They are integrated into communities from El Paso to Beaumont.
Some employers are now worried that many of their employees will be deported when President-elect Donald Trump returns to the White House.
Many Texas business leaders interviewed by the Tribune described a kind of wait-and-see trepidation about President Trump’s promised mass deportations. Business leaders say the impact of the deportations on Texas’ economy will largely depend on the details of Trump’s actions. However, those details are not yet clear.
“I don’t think anyone knows exactly what’s going to happen policy-wise. We’ve heard all the rhetoric,” said Andrea Coker of the North Texas Commission, a nonprofit that advocates for the Dallas area. ” he said.
The owner of an agricultural import/export business in the Rio Grande Valley, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of legal repercussions, said four of his seven employees are in the country illegally. Business owners estimated that if the government deported illegal immigrants en masse, most similar businesses would suffer.
Without undocumented workers, “we won’t be able to survive and we’ll have to close,” he said.
Farm workers move containers for packing grapefruit near Mission on Dec. 16, 2024.
credit:
Michael Gonzalez writes for the Texas Tribune
He said he hired undocumented workers because he had trouble finding American citizens or legal residents willing to do the grueling work.
“People who are here legally don’t want to work here. They’d rather collect the unemployed,” he said. “We’ve hired documented people, but they don’t last.”
In talking about mass deportations, President Trump and his incoming aides have said they would prioritize deporting people with criminal records, while also pointing out that people in the country illegally are committing crimes. Any large-scale deportation program will face legal and logistical challenges.
But Texas leaders are eager to support Mr. Trump, and the state is a target-rich environment. Pew Research Center estimates that undocumented immigrants make up about 8% of the state’s workforce, including a large presence in the hospitality, restaurant, energy and construction industries.
In 2006, the state comptroller’s office investigated what the state’s economy would be without the estimated 1.4 million illegal immigrants living in Texas in 2005. The study said their absence would cost the state about $17.7 billion in gross state product. The value of goods and services produced in Texas. The state has not updated the study since then. Replicated analyzes by universities and think tanks have reached similar conclusions: Undocumented Texans contribute more to the economy than they harm the state.
“We know that immigrants are punching above their weight,” said Jaime Puente, director of economic opportunity for the left-leaning nonprofit Every Texan. “We expect productivity to drop significantly.”
According to the Pew Research Center, construction has the highest rate of undocumented workers of any major industry in Texas. Housing experts say mass deportations could disrupt the state’s homebuilding industry amid a housing shortage, leading to fewer new homes being built and higher home prices and rents.
A recent paper by researchers at the University of Utah and the University of Wisconsin-Madison examines the impact after more than 300,000 undocumented immigrants were deported across the United States from 2008 to 2013. The study found that housing construction declined in areas where deportations took place. The local construction workforce has declined and housing prices have increased. Researchers found that other construction workers also lost their jobs as homebuilders cut back on new development.
“We’re actually in a situation where anything that disrupts the process of adding housing is going to have a negative impact on the housing affordability crisis,” said Riordan Frost, a senior research analyst at Harvard University’s Joint Housing Research Center. “There is,” he said.
Stan Marek’s Czech grandfather arrived in Houston in 1938 and began hanging sheetrock. Almost 100 years later, Marek’s family owns a large construction company based in Houston with about 1,000 employees.
“I have seen the stages of immigration,” said Malek, 77. “Eighty-five years later, our immigrants are here, as always, to do jobs that no one else wants or can do.”
Malek sees an opportunity to resolve a long-standing turmoil in the country’s immigration laws. He said deportations “would be very expensive and very counterproductive,” but granting broad amnesty to illegal aliens also would not work.
Malek said that by giving a path to citizenship to people who entered the country as children and received deportation protection through Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), the state’s labor shortage We believe that it is possible to reduce the He also believes in creating a similar program for adults to gain legal status, which he calls “Adult DACA,” so they can work legally.
“It’s not just construction. Who’s picking all the fruits and all the vegetables? Who’s milking all these cows? If you look at any job across the United States, there’s immigrants. ” Malek said. “We have to get the business community to step up. Business is more responsible for labor than anyone else, so that’s key.”
Virginia Bellew, executive director of the Permian Basin Regional Planning Commission, said mass deportations could reduce urban populations in the oil-rich Permian Basin, resulting in business closures and sales tax revenue. He said that there is a sex.
“I think you’ve seen communities just waiting for[President Trump to act]and not taking steps to anticipate, discuss, or decide,” Bellew said. said.
In Austin, a 43-year-old man who came from Mexico 25 years ago said his first job was sweeping debris from a construction site for less than $8 an hour. Currently, he is a general contractor’s foreman, overseeing projects and coordinating workers. He asked that his name not be published for fear of jeopardizing his pending residency application.
He tried not to let fear over President Trump’s promise of mass deportations take hold of him. He now has deep roots in Texas. He and his wife have raised their three children in the home they built in Austin.
His children are US citizens and his wife has legal status through DACA. He is in the process of applying for legal residency through his eldest daughter, who is a student at St. Edward’s University in Austin.
“I try to be a great citizen,” he said in Spanish. “(Trump) can’t just deport everyone because there are so many people who are essential to this country.”
Disclosure: All Texans and the North Texas Committee are financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization funded in part by contributions from members, foundations, and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. See the complete list of them here.
