STORY AND PHOTOS BY KAREN BOSSICK

In the beginning, it was the Welsh and Irishmen who were the immigrants, moving onto land long used by the Shoshone-Bannock to trap beaver and mine for silver. The Basque and Scottish came in the early 1900s to tend sheep in what was then the world’s second largest sheep exporter.

Austrian and German ski instructors came in 1936, recruited as ski instructors for the new Sun Valley Resort. The Peruvians succeeded the Basque as shepherds in the 1960s and ‘70s, and Mexican and other Latin Americans came to the valley in the 1990s to work the fields and build homes in a fast-growing economy.

They’re hardworking people who came here to work and want to work hard, said Lucy Abrahams, a medical interpreter at St. Luke’s Wood River. But many are scared, given rapidly escalating threats of deportations.

Lucy Abrahams was born in California but moved to Costa Rica at 8 where she completed grade school, high school and two years of college before returning to the United States to study architecture at the University of Texas-Austin.

“Think: What if you were them?” Becky Lopez asked a full house at Ketchum’s Community Library Wednesday night. “It’s love month—let’s show some compassion.”

The gathering was organized by the Spur Community Foundation as part of its ongoing series of community discussions. The idea: To learn about immigrants–some who have been in the valley more years than non-Hispanics who moved here five or even 20 years ago.

Spur Executive Director Sally Gillespie pointed to a 2024 study done by University of Idaho:

… There are 5,500 immigrants in the valley, making up 22 percent of the population (and that is likely an undercount)

Luis Campos, a former law professor, has a special focus on Asylum and Convention Against Torture cases.

… Hispanic students make up 45 percent of the students in the Blaine County School District as of May 2023

… There are 35,000 unauthorized immigrants in Idaho’s workforce; 86 percent of those are working and more than half remain in Idaho 16 years or longer

… These unauthorized immigrants and their employers pay withholding taxes on wages—taxes that will never benefit the immigrants

… In 2022 immigrants paid $71.9 million in state and local taxes.

Vinny Salinas said he’s often asked by students at school to interpret something the teacher has said.

There is a lot that non-Hispanics don’t know about these people, panelists said.

For instance, some of the children being placed in local public schools have not been in school for four years because their schools in Peru shut down during the COVID pandemic and never reopened. Some of these students come not knowing the alphabet or even how to write their name, said Brad Henson, principal of the dual-immersion Alturas Elementary School in Hailey.

Some of those who have moved to the valley are very high educated in fields like engineering, added Luis Campos, an attorney working in U.S. immigration law.

Lopez recounted the case of an engineer who had a good job in Mexico where his wife owned her own business. They fled to the United States after being threatened by the corrupt police officers and criminal organizations that have terrorized their country. They arrived here with no money, no home and no job. They live in a motel.

Becky Lopez attended K-through 12 in Blaine County public schools and worked for Power Engineers in the accounting department after getting a associate degree in Accounting at the College of Southern Idaho.

“They went from having everything to having nothing,” said Lopez, the executive director of the Alliance of Idaho, which provides low-cost immigration legal services for those in Blaine County.

Mexico is a dangerous place, which leads many to pay huge amounts and undertake enormous risks to come to the United States, said Campos: “So, the people who have made it here are truly resilient. Venezuela and Colombia are the same way. So, despite our country’s change in policies, people will continue to come.”

Not all immigrants speak Spanish, noted Abrahams, whose parents came to the United States from Costa Rica. Some Peruvians speak Quechua, an indigenous language of the Andes, and Peruvians have different dialects.

“They may understand Spanish words, but they don’t have comprehension,” she added.

Many Hispanics who grew up here don’t speak Spanish, said Henson. “One student told me: ‘Do you know how hard it is to live in this community and be Mexican and not speak Spanish?’ We get stuck on believing all the white people are the same and all the brown people are the same when they’re not.”

Abrahams said Hispanic children in the valley often have to interpret for their parents—“and it’s hard.”

“When I translated for my parents, I didn’t know if I translated correctly,” added Lopez, who was born in California to parents from Michoacan and Sinaloa, Mexico.

Campos recounted the story of a man who had his application for immigration status denied because of confusion with how his 17-year-old had interpreted the questions.

“The stakes were high and the father’s immigration status denied as a result. And, of course, his son was devastated,” he said.

With the new administration, children are hearing their parents’ concerns regarding deportation, Henson said. They don’t have the capacity to understand what’s going on, but they do understand Mom and Dad are scared.

Some students have been told that they will never get the right to vote; others are afraid their parents are going to be deported. And parents are questioning whether the government will take their birthright child if they are deported.

”A lot of kids at school have one documented parent and one undocumented parent. Some of those kids are worrying about getting their parents citizenship or what to do if their parents are deported,” said Vinny Salinas, a Wood River High School sophomore who aspires to become an immigration lawyer.

“My 8-year-od asked me, ‘Do we have the proper documents? Will we be taken away?’ The fact that my 8-year-old had to ask me if we were going to be okay was heartbreaking,” said Lopez.

Campos said he encourages people to apply for immigration status that would determine a person’s eligibility for government benefits, work authorization and other rights. “Often we find they could have after it’s too late,” he added.

Campos said employers have come to him wanting to sponsor employees who have been with them for years. But there are not a lot of ways employers can help because of a broken immigration system that has been unchanged for 30 years

“The asylum laws we have are also outdated, having come into being in the 1970s. They don’t consider for instance, climate refugees or violence against women,” Campos said. “The difference is more people are arriving and there’s more pushback. If I wanted to sponsor my sister today, the process would take 24, 25 years. That’s the line.”

BY LAW….

It’s not illegal to seek refuge or asylum in the United States, regardless of how you arrive.

Most people who cross the border without permission willingly turn themselves in, rather than trying to evade arrest, as it plugs them into the immigration process.

People go where they have connections or believe they can get a foothold on a new life.

Formal asylum application is done later at their own initiative and cost.

People are not eligible to apply for a work permit until 150 days after filing paperwork for asylum.

ICE either sends people back at the border, detains them for weeks or months or releases them into the United States with paperwork but no specific status. The latter people are given technical, complex documents and instructions that are in English. They ‘re required to check in with ICE at certain intervals.

SAFE SPACES?

Luis Campos said sensitive areas such as churches, hospitals, schools and courts have been off limits to ICE workers as long as he’s been practicing law. That changed two weeks ago when the Trump Administration declared that there is no safe space.

That said, ICE officers in Boise have told him that for the time being they will not invade safe areas.