Article|Archive
As New York City marks Immigrant Heritage Week, I think of how my parents fled the Soviet Union in 1979, seeking refuge from an authoritarian regime, unrelenting in its hostility toward Jews. At the heart of their journey was a desire most immigrants share: the wish for a better life and the promise of a free and democratic society, one that’s now under threat.
My parents became U.S. citizens in 1984, two years after my birth. If President Ronald Reagan had issued an executive order like President Trump’s revoking birthright citizenship, I and the many thousands of refugee families like mine — not to mention the millions of Americans who owe their citizenship to the 14th Amendment — might not be here today.
Just two months after Trump’s EO, the administration announced plans to revoke legal status for more than half a million migrants welcomed under the Biden-era humanitarian parole program, Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, Venezuela (CHNV), and it’s weighing similar measures to rescind protections for nearly 240,000 Ukrainian refugees — people much like my own parents.
The flurry of directives targeting lawful immigrants begs the question: what’s the “right” way to immigrate to America? For Jews, there almost never was one.
Early Jewish immigrants seeking legal avenues to American citizenship — the very process our government claims to encourage — faced deep-seated prejudice from officials committed to limiting their numbers. Despite being less than a quarter of the population, NYC Police Commissioner Theodore Bingham openly claimed that “Jews supplied half [of New York’s] criminals,” in 1908.
Congress passed the Johnson Reed Immigration Act in 1924 — dramatically restricting immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe, and completely banning it from Asia. Pennsylvania Sen. David Reed, a cosponsor of the bill, openly declared that the law would ensure the U.S. became “a more homogeneous nation and a vastly better place to live in,” a thinly veiled endorsement of nativist ideals.
Forty years later, the Jewish Congressman Emanuel Celler of Brooklyn finally abolished national-origin quotas by passing the Hart-Celler Act, which allowed approximately 600,000 Holocaust survivors to settle in the United States. But for the more than 900 Jews aboard the ocean liner St. Louis, who fled Nazi Germany in 1939 earlier seeking refuge in America, it came too late.
Just as 20th-century Jewish refugees faced restrictions that forced them into the shadows, today’s migrants—whether Venezuelan asylum seekers or Ukrainian refugees — have to navigate a labyrinth of legal roadblocks. And now, 20 states have backed policies that could strip protections from millions of immigrants who followed the rules and built their lives here legally.
And before we forget, immigration wasn’t exactly “legal” for several waves of early immigrants — Jews included. Upon reaching New York ports, gaining citizenship was as simple as declaring allegiance to the now-defunct Tammany Hall, the centuries-long Democratic political machine.
But surely, this quid pro quo defies all legal paths to citizenship: a truth that, in this climate, would nullify the rights of many Jewish, Italian, Irish, and other families living in our city today. Would we seriously make the claim that their descendants should leave America as a result? If we answer this both honestly and empathically, it’s a reminder that all immigrant communities seemingly spared from this administration’s “wanted” list, should stand with our neighbors currently facing removal.
Jews know firsthand that when America closes its doors to the world, it’s when our communities experience the most harm. For every fourth generation Jewish family in America, there’s two more in the Pale of Settlement that never make it past the pogroms.
And yet somehow, my grandparents managed to survive the Holocaust and the Soviet Union, to finally see their children settled safely in America. None of that would’ve been possible without the work of people like Manny Cellars who thrust the doors open for us, or outspoken Jewish organizers.
As we consider the federal government’s policies, we must remember our own history and ask ourselves what kind of precedent we’re establishing today. What does it mean for our national character if we accede to losing half a million people who followed legal pathways to build their lives here?
What message does it send about American reliability and values when we move the goalposts mid-game? And what does it mean for us if we turn our backs on the promise of this country that’s saved so many of us from death and destruction?
The answers to these questions will shape not just individual lives but our collective future as a nation of immigrants.
As New York City marks Immigrant Heritage Week, I think of how my parents fled the Soviet Union in 1979, seeking refuge from an authoritarian regime, unrelenting in its hostility toward Jews. At the heart of their journey was a desire most immigrants share: the wish for a better life and the promise of a free and democratic society, one that’s now under threat.
My parents became U.S. citizens in 1984, two years after my birth. If President Ronald Reagan had issued an executive order like President Trump’s revoking birthright citizenship, I and the many thousands of refugee families like mine — not to mention the millions of Americans who owe their citizenship to the 14th Amendment — might not be here today.
Just two months after Trump’s EO, the administration announced plans to revoke legal status for more than half a million migrants welcomed under the Biden-era humanitarian parole program, Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, Venezuela (CHNV), and it’s weighing similar measures to rescind protections for nearly 240,000 Ukrainian refugees — people much like my own parents.
The flurry of directives targeting lawful immigrants begs the question: what’s the “right” way to immigrate to America? For Jews, there almost never was one.
Early Jewish immigrants seeking legal avenues to American citizenship — the very process our government claims to encourage — faced deep-seated prejudice from officials committed to limiting their numbers. Despite being less than a quarter of the population, NYC Police Commissioner Theodore Bingham openly claimed that “Jews supplied half [of New York’s] criminals,” in 1908.
Congress passed the Johnson Reed Immigration Act in 1924 — dramatically restricting immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe, and completely banning it from Asia. Pennsylvania Sen. David Reed, a cosponsor of the bill, openly declared that the law would ensure the U.S. became “a more homogeneous nation and a vastly better place to live in,” a thinly veiled endorsement of nativist ideals.
Forty years later, the Jewish Congressman Emanuel Celler of Brooklyn finally abolished national-origin quotas by passing the Hart-Celler Act, which allowed approximately 600,000 Holocaust survivors to settle in the United States. But for the more than 900 Jews aboard the ocean liner St. Louis, who fled Nazi Germany in 1939 earlier seeking refuge in America, it came too late.
Just as 20th-century Jewish refugees faced restrictions that forced them into the shadows, today’s migrants—whether Venezuelan asylum seekers or Ukrainian refugees — have to navigate a labyrinth of legal roadblocks. And now, 20 states have backed policies that could strip protections from millions of immigrants who followed the rules and built their lives here legally.
And before we forget, immigration wasn’t exactly “legal” for several waves of early immigrants — Jews included. Upon reaching New York ports, gaining citizenship was as simple as declaring allegiance to the now-defunct Tammany Hall, the centuries-long Democratic political machine.
But surely, this quid pro quo defies all legal paths to citizenship: a truth that, in this climate, would nullify the rights of many Jewish, Italian, Irish, and other families living in our city today. Would we seriously make the claim that their descendants should leave America as a result? If we answer this both honestly and empathically, it’s a reminder that all immigrant communities seemingly spared from this administration’s “wanted” list, should stand with our neighbors currently facing removal.
Jews know firsthand that when America closes its doors to the world, it’s when our communities experience the most harm. For every fourth generation Jewish family in America, there’s two more in the Pale of Settlement that never make it past the pogroms.
And yet somehow, my grandparents managed to survive the Holocaust and the Soviet Union, to finally see their children settled safely in America. None of that would’ve been possible without the work of people like Manny Cellars who thrust the doors open for us, or outspoken Jewish organizers.
As we consider the federal government’s policies, we must remember our own history and ask ourselves what kind of precedent we’re establishing today. What does it mean for our national character if we accede to losing half a million people who followed legal pathways to build their lives here?
What message does it send about American reliability and values when we move the goalposts mid-game? And what does it mean for us if we turn our backs on the promise of this country that’s saved so many of us from death and destruction?
The answers to these questions will shape not just individual lives but our collective future as a nation of immigrants.
