With the U.S. presidential election just weeks away, a major issue shaping both campaigns is immigration, with both candidates laying out how they plan to swiftly quell the unprecedented influx of migrants at the southern border.

The “tough” talk, however, is an example of the ways politicians “weaponize” immigration, says journalist Jonathan Blitzer of The New Yorker, and does little to address the lives of immigrants who are being impacted by the failures of the U.S. government.

“This is what the politics have done to this issue — taken a rich, complex topic that is very much deserving of our time and attention and reduced it to the simplest and most misleading slogans about the border,” said Blitzer at an October 10 roundtable discussion on immigration hosted by the Jackson School’s Brady-Johnson Program on Grand Strategy.

Blitzer was joined by Oscar Chacón, co-founder and strategic advisor of Alianza Americas, a Chicago-based migrant advocacy group, and Kica Matos, president of the National Immigration Law Center and the Immigrant Justice Fund. Michael Brenes, co- director of the Grand Strategy program, served as moderator.

The panelists agreed that the situation at the southern border is, in fact, a crisis. According to statistics from U.S. Customs and Border Protection, border crossings reached a record high at the end of 2023. Though monthly border crossings have decreased, more than 2 million migrants have crossed the U.S.-Mexico border already in 2024.

But handling the crisis at the border, the panelists said, is not the same as creating policies aimed at the broader issue of immigration reform.

“For the first time for me, we’re seeing both parties not only incapable of advancing an agenda forward, but both have adopted an anti-immigrant agenda that seems to begin and end with the border,” said Matos. “Everything seems reductionist, reduced simply to the border.”

The panelists also discussed plans being made by immigration advocacy groups based on the results of the election. Matos outlined multiple threats that Republication presidential candidate Donald Trump has made toward immigrants during his campaign, including mass deportations, family separations, and ending birthright citizenship — measures that, she reminded, caused a public uproar during Trump’s first term in office.

“I will tell you — the law is not going to be enough to stop this,” said Matos. “[Last time], it was Americans who were outraged by what they were seeing. Part of our strategy is how we make sure that we deploy the energy of Americans who are repulsed by the idea that our democracy is engaging in these kinds of practices.”

Chacón, who arrived in the U.S. as an undocumented immigrant, stressed a need to change the narrative surrounding immigration — not just by toning down the rhetoric but by continuing to empower immigrant communities who, in many cases, feel as though the U.S. is their home.

“Only objects and actions are illegal; people can never be illegal,” said Chacón. “What gives me hope, in spite of everything, is that we have made this country our country … I am inspired by the people who manifest resilience and joy and are determined to thrive despite the way they’re treated in this country.”