Menu
Idea

Bracero Program

Back out to migrant workers
29
View on Map
Filter by:

Filter by published date

A U.S. Border Patrol officer shows how he found an undocumented Mexican immigrant under the hood of a car along the U.S.-Mexican border in March 1954.

Trump Promises to Deport All Undocumented Immigrants, Resurrecting a 1950s Strategy

Donald Trump says he will authorize a roundup of all 11 million undocumented immigrants in the country. A 1950s program with similar goals offers lessons.
by Katrina Burgess via The Conversation on May 6, 2024
A small farmworker house in Ventura with children playing outside.

Reimagining Resistance, Reconstructing Community

Farmworker housing cooperatives in Ventura County, California.
by Frank P. Barajas via Tropics of Meta on January 12, 2024
Farmers working in an orchard.
partner

The Unlikely Supporters of a Bill That Would Increase Guest Workers

The history of guest worker programs should give pause to supporters of the Farm Workforce Modernization Act.
by Matt Garcia via Made By History on December 14, 2022

The Deportation Machine

A new book documents the history of three specific mechanisms of expulsion: formal deportation, voluntary departure, and "self-deportation."
by Hilary Goodfriend via NACLA on September 25, 2020
Armed troops wearing gas masks walk through tear gas at Black Lives Matter protest.
partner

The Extraordinary Scene Unfolding in Portland Has a Disturbing History

How immigration enforcement and policing became entwined
by Ivón Padilla-Rodríguez via Made By History on July 19, 2020
Trump looks at border wall construction prototypes.
partner

The Hole in Donald Trump’s Wall

As long as Americans continue to flood into Mexico, the wall will do little to deter crossings.
by Tore C. Olsson via Made By History on January 9, 2019

When The U.S. Government Tried To Replace Migrant Farmworkers With High Schoolers

When the blazing sun came up on the teenagers' first day of work, "everyone looked at each other, and said, 'What did we do?'"
by Gustavo Arellano via NPR on August 23, 2018

Piecing Together a Border’s History, One Love Letter at a Time

Finding a puzzle from the past in a family member’s basement.
by Miroslava Chávez-García via Lapham’s Quarterly on May 16, 2018
Border patrol guarding a group of men sitting on the ground.

The Long History of Deportation Scare Tactics at the U.S.-Mexico Border

The precedents for Trump’s hyped-up immigration crackdown.
by Kelly Lytle Hernández, Cora Currier via The Intercept on February 26, 2017

What the Mass Deportation of Immigrants Might Look Like

Operation Wetback didn't merely enforce immigration law-it enforced the idea that American citizens are white.
by Shannon Keating via Slate on November 16, 2016
Over the next 50 years, Asians will surge past Latinos to become the largest group of immigrants heading to the U.S., according to a new study. Above, a naturalization ceremony in New York City in 2013.

The Law That Created Illegal Immigration

Discussion of the Hart-Cellar Act that was passed 50 years ago.
by Jane H. Hong via Los Angeles Times on October 2, 2015
Day laborer pumping up tire on tractor on large farm near Ralls, Texas, 1939.
partner

Stories of the Land: Diverse Agricultural Histories in the U.S.

An exhibit featuring public radio and television programs broadcast over 65 years that explore American agricultural life.
by Mariah E. Marsden via American Archive of Public Broadcasting on July 29, 2024
Mrs. Ernest Ortega, from Reseda, holding a large lemon from her tree.

Lemons in LA

How the fruit helped create the California dream.
by Hadley Meares via LAist on June 21, 2024
Collage of photographs of U.S. Border Patrol.

The Racist Origins of America’s Broken Immigration System

How a little-known, century-old law perpetuated the odious notion that certain types of immigrants degrade our nation’s character.
by Felipe De La Hoz via The New Republic on May 1, 2024
A Mexican family stands next to the border wall between Mexico and the United States, in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico on May 23, 2017.
partner

America’s Border Wall Is Bipartisan

Biden continues a tradition of building fences at the US-Mexico border that long precedes Donald Trump.
by Mary Mendoza via Made By History on October 30, 2023
Television camera operator at work.
partner

Latino Empowerment Through Public Broadcasting

How Latinos have used public radio and television to communicate their cultures, histories, hopes, and concerns.
by Alexandra García, Gabriela Rivera via American Archive of Public Broadcasting on November 23, 2021

Things as They Are

Dorothea Lange created a vast archive of the twentieth century’s crises in America. For years her work was censored, misused, impounded, or simply rejected.
by Valeria Luiselli via New York Review of Books on October 29, 2020
partner

Migrant Detention Centers Have a Long History of Medical Neglect and Abuse

The link between medical abuse, racism and immigration runs deep.
by Jessica Ordaz via Made By History on September 18, 2020
A sign at a beach warning of sewage contaminated water.
partner

San Diego and Tijuana’s Shared Sewage Problem Has a Long History

U.S. imperialism and private enterprise in the region have created ecological peril.
by Kevan Q. Malone via Made By History on June 2, 2020
Farmworkers in a field.
partner

During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Immigrant Farmworkers Are Heroes

Our thanks should be recognizing the crucial role they play in our society.
by Eladio Bobadilla via Made By History on March 31, 2020

Immigration Enforcement and the U.S.-Mexico Border

A microsyllabus on the history of the U.S.-Mexico border, refugees, and deportation.
by Adam Goodman, Maddalena Marinari, Evan Tarapata, María Cristina García via The Abusable Past on September 11, 2019

The Myth of the American Frontier

Greg Grandin’s new book charts the past and present of American expansionism and its high human costs.
by Jedediah Britton-Purdy via The Nation on April 1, 2019

The Lucky Ones

I told her we were brought over the Rio Grande on a raft. I never called it a smuggling.
by Adriana Gallardo via Guernica on February 19, 2019
A private security guard throws a soccer ball back inside the Tornillo detention camp for migrant teens in Tornillo, Texas, Dec. 13, 2018.

A Historian on How Trump’s Wall Rhetoric Changes Lives in Mexico

The U.S. did not always find it necessary to lock up people seeking asylum.
by Ana Raquel Minian, Isaac Chotiner via The New Yorker on February 15, 2019
Border patrol guarding a group of men sitting on the ground.
partner

A Wall Can’t Solve America’s Addiction to Undocumented Immigration

For more than 70 years, undocumented immigrants have shaped the American economy.
by Julia G. Young via Made By History on January 9, 2019

Field of Dreams

Migrant futboleros in greater Mexico.
by Romeo Guzman via Boom California on June 13, 2018

37 Maps That Explain How America Is a Nation of Immigrants

It's impossible to understand the country without knowing who's been kept out, who's been let in, and how they've been treated once they arrive.
by Dara Lind via Vox on January 12, 2015

The 10 Best Songs About Illegal Immigration

Over the past decade, music devoted to the cause of amnesty for undocumented immigrants has flourished across the U.S.
by Gustavo Arellano via OC Weekly on November 12, 2013

Border Patrol - Our Oral History

A compilation of interviews with former U.S. Border Patrol officers who served from the 1930s-1960s.
via Border Patrol Museum on May 16, 1987

Filter Results:

Suggested Filters:

Idea

brought to you by
© Bunk History