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The Trump administration appears to be painting all non-US citizens (immigrants with Green Cards, Temporary Protective Status, asylees and the undocumented) with the same broad brush by often referring to them as if they were all insane, criminals, gang members or rapists and here to cause trouble. That is not the case, and it is most certainly politically, if not racially, motivated.

The U.S. economy and our comfortable way of life depends on immigration and these hard-working people and their money. Those entering the country with a non-immigrant visa are under extremely strict guidelines and working conditions and are entirely dependent on the business sponsoring the visa. They can only enter the country under the terms of the visa agreement and must depart the moment the visa ends.

There is no limit on seasonal H2A agricultural visas because we critically rely on the workers. We need these people to have food on our tables. The H2B non-agricultural temporary worker visa program met its annual statutory limit by Jan. 7, and Homeland Security nearly doubled the cap from 66,000 to more the 130,000 just to meet the need for people to do the jobs that couldn’t be filled by “ready, able and qualified American workers.� On the Eastern Shore, large numbers of people are needed to “pick crabs� and without them an entire industry would be at grave risk.

My fear is that the ultra-MAGA rhetoric that blasts from the White House on a near daily basis is dehumanizing all non-US citizens and creating an us-versus-them paradigm that will desensitize the public to inhumane treatment of these people. Yes, some undocumented people live here, most are contributing members of our society, and many have spouses and children who are, in fact, U.S. citizens.

They pay taxes and rent and shop in local stores and are in every way a member of our society except for a piece of paper. These undocumented immigrants need a commonsense path to citizenship. They are here to realize the American dream of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Many had to flee their homeland under threat of violence and death. They are here and contributing more than they are taking.

At the very least, in this supposedly law-abiding country, every person should be granted the opportunity for legal representation and shouldn’t be subjected to the threat of arrest, having their families ripped apart, being whisked away to unknown and perhaps foreign detention centers with no warning and deported without formal charges, opportunity for due process or even evidence. The America that I respect and honor protects the poor, the rich, the citizen and non-citizen.

Since so many reduce everything to dollars and cents, you also should know that according to the comptroller of Maryland’s State of the Economy Series: Immigration and the Economy, released in April 2024, “The American Immigration Council estimates that in 2021 Maryland’s combined population of immigrants paid $13.3 billion in federal, state, and local taxes and had total spending power of $33.1 billion.�

And this doesn’t include the huge financial contributions of workers with non-immigrant visas. These people are our neighbors, our friends and coworkers, and we need them. They deserve our respect and appreciation for doing hard work, doing it well and often being overlooked and unappreciated.