We Are Living Through This — And Social Workers Cannot Look Away

*This article is part of a collaborative series that focuses on the issue of immigration and how it impacts our work as social workers. Stay tuned for additional articles that seek to help inform Michigan Social Workers about the unique issues that affect those living with varying immigration statuses across micro, mezzo and macro practice areas. This series is being organized, developed and implemented by:

Jenny Bishop LMSW, Therapist & Co-Owner of Elevated Therapeutic Services LLC

Holly DeVivo DSW(s), LMSW, Therapist & Co-Owner of Elevated Therapeutic Services LLC

Sara Camilleri LMSW QIDP, Solo Practitioner of Sand River Therapy

We Are Living Through This — And Social Workers Cannot Look Away

I am outraged.

I am disgusted.

I am heartbroken.

Our country is living through unprecedented times—times in which entire communities are being targeted, terrorized, and stripped of dignity without remorse or humanity. What we are witnessing is not abstract policy or political debate. It is trauma. It is state violence. It is the systematic dehumanization of people who are our clients, our neighbors, our colleagues, and our loved ones.

This article reflects my personal opinion and professional perspective as a social worker. I am not an attorney. But I am someone trained to recognize harm, to name injustice, and to act when systems fail the people they are supposed to protect.

And right now, those systems are failing—catastrophically.

What Is Happening: A Timeline of Escalation

Since President Trump’s second term began on January 20, 2025, federal immigration enforcement has expanded rapidly and aggressively, with devastating consequences.

●  January 20, 2025: Expanded expedited removal authority and elimination of prior enforcement prioritization

●  January 23–24: Operation Safeguard — multi-city enforcement surge across Boston, Denver, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Seattle, Miami, and Washington D.C., resulting in 538 detentions

●  January 23, 2025: Worksite raids resumed, sometimes without judicial warrants

●  February 2025: ICE leadership reassigned to accelerate arrests and deportations nationwide

●  April 21–26, 2025: Florida statewide sweep resulting in over 1,100 arrests

●  June 2025: Los Angeles Apparel District raids targeting manufacturing workers

●  June 20, 2025: 319 people detained during a farm raid near Camarillo, California

●  October 2025: Operation Midway Blitz began in the Chicago area

●  December 2025 – ongoing: Operation Metro Surge deployed thousands of ICE agents across the Minneapolis–Saint Paul region

●  January 2026: Operation Salvo announced in New York City following the murder of Renee Good

In January 2026, two U.S. citizens were the victims of excessive force resulting in the tragic loss of their life. Alex Pretti, and Renee Good. Their deaths have sparked outrage and political action across the nation. However, it is critical for social workers to acknowledge that at the time of this article there are four other people who have died as a result of ICE’s actions this year alone.

This number does not include those who are detained. Silverio Villegas González, Jaime Alanis, Roberto Carlos Montoya Valdez and Josué Castro Rivera’s names are just as important.

A Dangerous Shift: From Custody to Community

ICE has moved away from primarily detaining individuals already in local custody to at-large arrests throughout communities. This includes enforcement actions in spaces once considered “sensitive locations”:

●  Schools

●  Hospitals

●  Courts

●  Places of worship

These are the very places where social workers show up every day. While media access has given us all an array of information, it is important to acknowledge that everything that is happening, is not always publicized, or in our algorithms.

It is estimated that hundreds of thousands of people have been detained or deported since January 2025—many without criminal convictions, many following required processes, many simply living their lives.

What Social Workers Can Do Right Now: Micro, Mezzo, and Macro Action

Micro: What We Can Do With Clients Right Now

At the individual and family level, social workers can:

●  Validate fear, grief, anger, and confusion without minimizing or offering false reassurance

●  Integrate immigration-related safety planning into assessments and ongoing work

●  Share basic “know your rights” information as harm reduction

●  Practice rights-based scripts with clients to reduce panic during encounters

●  Help clients identify emergency contacts, childcare plans, and medical contingencies

●  Reduce retraumatization by avoiding unnecessary questions about immigration status

●  Document client experiences accurately and neutrally, recognizing that records matter

●  Offer telehealth sessions if possible for safety

●  Be mindful to not further oppress people by making this an individual problem they are coping with when the oppression is the cause not the person's coping

Mezzo: What We Can Do Within Institutions and Communities

At the mezzo level, social workers can:

●  Advocate within schools, hospitals, shelters, and agencies for clear non-cooperation and confidentiality policies

●  Ensure emergency contact and caregiver authorization processes are accessible and updated

●  Partner with immigrant-led organizations and legal service providers

●  Organize or participate in know-your-rights trainings and community education

●  Support court accompaniment, family support networks, and mutual aid efforts

●  Interrupt misinformation and dehumanizing narratives within professional spaces

●  Create internal protocols for responding to ICE presence or client detention

Macro: What We Can Do to Challenge Systems

At the macro level, social workers can:

●  Publicly oppose policies and practices that violate human rights and due process

●  Use our professional credibility to speak, write, and testify about the impacts of enforcement

●  Support legislation and policy efforts that protect immigrant communities

●  Hold professional organizations accountable for taking clear positions

●  Push agencies and systems to align practice with ethical obligations

●  Refuse neutrality when neutrality enables harm

Macro work is not optional when policy itself is the source of trauma.

A Note on Ethical Advocacy

Advocacy is incredibly important as part of the social change process. It’s important however to consider ethical approaches to advocacy that don’t directly or indirectly harm impacted community members. Ethical advocacy can look like practicing cultural humility by way of working alongside or supporting advocacy methods of impacted communities. It can look like ensuring accurate information about resources is shared on social media or through other methods versus sharing everything without fact checking. It can look like considering how your advocacy may feel for the impacted community; for example, could my idea cause more fear or perpetuate trauma? Ethical advocacy could look like protesting peacefully, especially during a time when the behavioral pattern demonstrated is retaliation. And perhaps most importantly, ethical advocacy can look like reflecting on if we are engaging in colonized behavior such as white saviorism or other privilege based behaviors which can often be well meaning but ultimately result in more oppressive outcomes, particularly in the area of human dignity, personal agency or harm.

Why This Matters:

When social workers limit themselves to individual interventions, we risk becoming caretakers of harm rather than challengers of it. Engaging fully at micro, mezzo, and macro levels allows us not only to support survival, but to confront the conditions making survival necessary in the first place. This is not extra work. This is the work.

What we are witnessing now is horrifying—but it is not new. The terror currently being publicized has long been a daily reality for immigrant communities. What is new is who is being asked to see it. As a white woman, I often hear people who look like me say they need breaks from the news. That alone is a privilege. For many communities, there is no break—only vigilance, survival, and fear. As social workers, our ethics require us to see this clearly, speak honestly, and act boldly. This moment will be remembered. Not for who stayed comfortable, but for who chose humanity.

And I refuse to look away.