Stories
Mental Health Counselor’s Life in Limbo Without DACA Solution
The last time Nidya was in Nayarit, a state on the west coast of Mexico where she was born, she was just 2 years old. That’s when she moved with her parents to San Diego. Since then, she has thrived. She attended the University of California, Santa Cruz, and received… Read More
Without Migrant Labor, a Minnesota Resort’s 460 U.S. Workers at Risk
Ben Thuringer is the managing director of Madden’s on Gull Lake, a resort founded by his grandfather in 1929 in the Brainerd Lakes Region of Central Minnesota. The family resort is a seasonal getaway, operating April through October, with more than 1,000 acres and 283 rooms. “Of the 520 people… Read More
Resettled Refugees Contribute Millions to Wisconsin Economy
Since it first opened its doors in 2012, the Christian nonprofit World Relief Fox Valley has resettled 700 refugees in Appleton and Oshkosh, in Wisconsin. “The communities have been supportive, and anyone who doesn’t support the mission doesn’t understand the program or who refugees are,” says the organization’s director, Tami… Read More
Americans Forget They Descend From Immigrants, Says Minnesotan
Aaron J. Brown, a community college instructor and proud native of Hibbing, Minnesota, says some on the Mesabi Iron Range seem to have forgotten that they are the descendants of immigrants. A century ago, Hibbing was as diverse as New York City is today. “Many great-great-grandparents of Hibbing residents came… Read More
Americans Don’t Apply, Wisconsin Dairy Farmer Says
Paul Fetzer is the fourth-generation owner of his family’s dairy farm, Fetzer Farms, which he operates with his brothers in Elmwood, Wisconsin. With 1,350 cows, the business requires 26 full-time employees, and today 18 of those employees are immigrants. “We’ll put ads out locally trying to attract American-born workers, and… Read More
Immigrant Talent Critical To U.S. Dominance, Says Economist
Peter Orazem is an economist and professor at Iowa State University, where he’s taught for 34 years. Orazem’s career has given him insight into how much the United States relies on both high- and low-skilled immigrants to move our economy forward. “We have a country that’s capital rich and labor… Read More
Minister Asks Christian Colleagues to Step Up on Behalf of Immigrants
During his commute to Texas Christian University, in Fort Worth, religion professor Santiago Piñón passes about 20 churches, many of which have billboards advertising the next Sunday’s sermon. “I have never seen one that said ‘Welcome the Stranger’ or ‘Be Kind to Your Neighbor.’ I would have been there. I… Read More
Without More Foreign Workers, Oregon Vintner Asks, ‘What Will We Do?’
In the 1970s, when Patricia Dudley and her husband left academic jobs to grow pinot noir grapes, they ran the small vineyard with family co-owners. “We wanted to be more connected to the natural world and the earth,” says Dudley, president of Bethel Heights Vineyard, in Oregon’s Willamette Valley. “In… Read More
Minnesota Farms Depend on Immigrant Workers and Foreign Students
Jim Riddle is the owner of Blue Fruit Farm in Winona, Minnesota, where he raises organic perennial fruits on a 5-acre plot of land. Riddle and his wife keep the operation small so they can get by on their own labor and that of crew leaders and a handful of… Read More
Pastor Sees Immigrants Through Lens of Bible — and the Economy
Dr. Carl Ruby, a conservative Christian pastor at Central Christian Church in Springfield, Ohio, believes that immigration reform is a civil rights issue. It was a lesson he learned decades ago, when he first read Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail.” “I saw that it was an issue… Read More
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