Chinese represent the second largest group of illegal immigrants in the United States. More than half a million have arrived since the late 1980s – nearly enough to repopulate Boston. More than 200,000 are estimated to live in Southern California alone. Yet during the past few months, as millions have protested either against or for immigration the debate has gone ahead with the Chinese population in absentia.
So what exactly happened to the Chinese immigrant population during the recent protests? Why did they choose not to participate – or did someone make that decision for them? Do they simply not care about immigration issues as much as Latinos?
To learn more about the Chinese immigrant community and the media's coverage of it, News 21 sat down with producer Eric Olander and reporter Roy Lu at LA18, the largest Asian-language TV network in Los Angeles. (LA18 also broadcasts in Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese.)
“The mainstream media, from what I can see, don’t cover illegal Chinese immigration,” Olander said, sitting on the capacious LA18 soundstage. “The emphasis is on the Mexican population. But it’s not only Mexicans that are coming into the United States, and I actually think it puts undue burden on the Mexican American population (to think like that).”
Roy Lu said that in order to understand the illegal Chinese population, it is important to understand just how difficult it is for them to get to America.
“(Chinese immigrants) are not like Mexican people who, if they get deported by the U.S. government, they can come back at any minute,” Lu said. “If they get deported back to China, they don’t have a second chance. So they try to be quiet because they have to sacrifice a lot just to get here.”
Twenty years ago, illegal Chinese immigrants were known commonly as “18K travelers” because of the roughly $18,000 they paid human smugglers – or “snakeheads” – to get them across the Pacific. But inflation is a bear: That number has skyrocketed to $70,000 today.
Such an exorbitant debt puts the immigrants on horrendous footing as they try to begin their lives anew in the United States.
“They are basically indentured servants until they pay off that debt, working as prostitutes or in kitchens, or in hotels, in jobs that are not very appealing. Jobs that no one would want to do,” Olander said.
Around 4,000 homeless Chinese live in the San Gabriel Valley alone – the epicenter of Los Angeles’ illegal Chinese community. Those who can afford rent often live in “garage inns,” or small homes shared by many single immigrants. They sleep in shifts to maximize the occupancy. Like Mexican immigrants, they often send large portions of their paychecks home in the form of remittances.
In communities like Alhambra, “the street parking is always full,” Lu said. “They are overcrowding people, and it’s just so concentrated in that area.”
“One of the ladies I interviewed told me that when she came here, the first job she did was for 14 hours a day, nonstop,” he said. “So when she went home she couldn’t even (use her hands to) open the door, because she was so tired.”
Ultimately, there is no pat answer as to why Chinese immigrants have been absent from the immigration debate gripping the country in recent months. But there are many possibilities. For starters, although they number in the hundreds of thousands, the Chinese immigrant population is still small when compared with Latinos. Asians as a whole make up just 13 percent of the illegal immigrant populations, while Latinos make up 78 percent.
The complexity of America’s political system is also a hurdle. Many Chinese immigrants simply don’t understand the debate and its context. To understand how a bill is formed and ratified is tricky. By the time the bill has made it “to the White House to be signed as a law – I guarantee most Americans couldn’t figure that out, much less an immigrant who doesn’t speak English,” Olander said.
Many Chinese immigrants can’t comprehend the idea of political protest – even in a philosophical sense. In China, protest simply does not exist as a form of normal political expression. “You have to understand that a lot of people who come to the United States come from societies where the police have a much more substantive role…than what we have here,” Olander said.
“(At LA18), we have to spend a lot of time educating people so they know that when you call 911, the police can’t just come into your home unless they have the right to do that.”
Finally, there is less diversity of opinion within the Latino community about immigration. Many Chinese immigrants wait for decades to come to the United States legally, and they resent others cutting the line. Callers to a recent talk show on immigration demonstrated just how disparate their views can be.
“We had a lot of calls that were angry over the protests in L.A., because they had to wait 15, 16, 17 years, so what gives these people the right?” Olander said. “But then we got calls on the same show that said we should stand up with our Latino brothers.”
Olander said that although the ethnic media does have a responsibility to explain the immigration protests and their consequences to immigrants, it does not have to make them care.
“We don’t see our role as to take an agenda,” he said. “We see our news department like any other news department – to be impartial. Our job is to provide information, and what people choose to do with that information is up to them.”
Nevertheless, Olander said the issue of immigration is never too far beneath the surface.
“You have to remember,” he said. “While this may have just shown up in the general media as an issue, and fades out to make room for other stories, for us this is a persistent issue.
“We cover immigration every week of the year, in and out.”
Watch video of Olander describing the
history of LA-18, and their involvement with immigrant communities.
Video Clips of the Eric Olander Interview:
How does your news programming break down, between local LA news and news from countries in Asia? (View the video)
What challenges do Chinese – and other Asian – immigrants face when they get here? What connections do you help them make with their new country? (View the video)
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