Kamala Harris is breaking barriers for Tamil Americans. But we need more.
By now, we know of Kamala Harris as a “first.” She was the first Black woman to serve as California’s Attorney General, the first U.S. senator of South Asian descent, and now is the first mixed-race Black and Asian woman named a vice presidential candidate on a major party ticket.
Harris is also arguably the most visible Tamil American in politics. But for some Tamils there is more at stake than just identity in this election.
This summer, the first person of Tamil descent went to the Supreme Court. Vijayakumar Thuraissigiam, a Tamil asylum seeker who fled Sri Lanka, went before the highest court to argue his flawed asylum decision. Thuraissigiam, who was represented by the ACLU, argued that his asylum plea was rejected due to officers’ misunderstanding of Sri Lanka’s politics and poor language translation. He was then placed in “expedited removal” proceedings.
The Supreme Court determined that a review of his case was beyond its scope, leaving Thuraissigiam and other asylum-seekers like him without recourse.The lack of judicial review gives immigration officers unchecked authority on asylum decisions, and the decision has created a precedent that is already being used as the basis for deportation cases.
For those marking Harris as their most visible Tamil and Jamaican American political representation, the question remains: Will Harris’s identities translate into justice and accountability for her communities?
This summer’s case was not just about Tamils, but about all asylum seekers and the barriers they face, which are even greater for those at the intersections of ethnic, sex, sexuality, and caste persecution. The ruling has potentially devastating implications for Black, Indigenous and Latinx immigrants — including Jamaicans, who have experienced high asylum denial rates of 92 percent. Indigenous migrants from Central America already contend with prolonged detention and unjust decisions due to lack of language interpretation. Black immigrants are also significantly more targeted for detention and deportation due to the disproportionate over-policing of Black communities. Just this year, the U.S. unjustly detained more Haitian families with children than any other nationality while also setting bonds for Haitian immigrants on average 54 percent higher than other immigrants.
Biden has repeatedly made statements supporting a moratorium on deportations for his first 100 days in office. It is a promising statement, but is just the first step a Democratic administration must take to undo the damage done by Trump. His campaign also failed to include this moratorium in its official platform.
In the past, Harris has publicly supported the right to due process for asylum seekers. In 2019, she supported Representative Pramila Jayapal’s Access to Counsel Act which would require legal representation for those subjected to “prolonged inspection by CBP.” She also cosponsored the Refugee Protection Act of 2019, saying, “It’s not enough to undo the harm that has already been done — we must also revitalize our refugee and asylum system and expand protections for these individuals.” Despite this commitment to the rights of asylum seekers, Harris did not make any public statement regarding DHS v. Thuraissigiam and its potential impacts.
There’s a lot to be done. Under the current administration, a series of well-designed attacks have been launched against asylum. This summer alone additional rules have expanded expedited removal and redefined persecution. The administration leveraged the COVID-19 pandemic, without a sound medical basis, to expand bans on asylum applicants arriving from countries with “deadly communicable diseases.” There also was a recent proposed rule that shortens the deadline for filing asylum claims to two weeks and imposes prohibitive fees that will impact all asylum seekers.
A Biden-Harris administration has the power to undo these horrifying decisions. For those who look to Harris as a “first,” or as a representation of their own identities, this is an opportunity to hold her accountable to a vision of an asylum system that propels toward greater safety for all and the defunding of violent, racist policing systems.
