Let me just say it plainly: Black folks can’t sit this immigration fight out. Not now. Not ever.
I know we’re tired. Tired of carrying movements, of being the moral compass of the country, of fighting for justice that never seems to swing our way. I get it. We’re tired of the headlines, the hashtags, the heartbreak. And maybe you’re tempted to sit this one out—to let others carry the load, to sit on the rooftop with your sweet tea while immigration battles rage on below.
But if we think we can watch from the sidelines while ICE raids snatch up our Brown neighbors, let me be clear: That same system is already coming for us, too.
It’s coming in the form of racial profiling, flawed facial recognition algorithms and government databases riddled with errors. It’s coming with militarized raids that don’t ask about citizenship status before they knock down your door. It’s coming through the same systemic pipeline that has always criminalized Black and Brown bodies. Immigration enforcement may be the tip of the spear, but the whole sword is built on anti-Blackness.
According to the Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement, over a quarter of Black adult U.S. citizens do not have a driver’s license with their current name or address. Nearly one in five don’t have a license at all. And in a country where the line between “undocumented” and “unverified” is getting blurrier by the day, what do you think happens when a Black person can’t immediately prove their citizenship?
They get detained. Deported. Disappeared.
There are documented cases—plural—of Black American citizens being held in ICE detention centers, some for weeks, some for months. Some had birth certificates in hand. It didn’t matter. Their skin, their names and their neighborhoods were deemed “suspicious.” And if we think that can’t happen to us or our loved ones, we’re already in danger.
This is not just about immigrants. This is about state power and who it decides to target. The same ICE that terrorizes immigrant families will be the same force that justifies expanding surveillance in Black communities. The drones over the border don’t stop at the border. The same predictive policing that flags “high-risk” zip codes already patrols ours. And the normalization of kicking down doors in Brown neighborhoods? That’s rehearsal for Black neighborhoods, too.
It’s all connected.
So no, maybe you don’t go out to the protests. Maybe you don’t chant in the streets or call your senator. But you don’t sit and sip tea either. Not while the smoke rises. Not while state violence becomes more precise, more data-driven and more relentless.
We have to show up—not just because it’s right, but because we’re already in the fight whether we admit it or not. Citizenship doesn’t protect us. Birthright doesn’t shield us. And silence won’t save us.
If they can come for them, they can—and will—come for us.
