Who Does America Want?

WHO DOES AMERICA WANT?

JARIENN JAMES*

TABLE OF CONTENTS

I. INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 325

II. NOT THE PERSON OF COLOR, DEFINITELY NOT THE BLACK MAN . . . . 326

A. Connecticut .................................. 327

B. South Carolina . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329

C. Florida . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 331

D. Georgia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 333

F. The Need for Alternatives and the Impact of COVID-19 . . . 335

III. NOT THE IMMIGRANT ................................. 337

A. Who are these Immigrants? ....................... 337

B. What is the H-1B Process? ....................... 338

C. Naturalization Through Marriage. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341

IV. CONCLUSION ...................................... 346

I. INTRODUCTION

Who does America want? Not the immigrant, not the poor, not the Brown,

and certainly not the Black person. When America cannot kill Black and

Brown people with its knees, it suffocates them with f‌ines and fees. Black,

Brown, and poor people are deliberately excluded from society through f‌ines

and fees for traff‌ic offenses. If America treats its own citizens with such con-

tempt, why should immigrants expect better treatment?

* Jarienn A. James, LL.B., LL.M., J.D., is the Law and Justice Program Coordinator at New York

Law School and Co-Chair of the Education and the Law Committee of the New York City Bar

Association. This paper is dedicated to those who bear the burden of America’s racism and classism.

© 2021, Jarienn James.

325

This paper juxtaposes immigration-related fees with the f‌ines and fees for

traff‌ic violations to help the reader understand that America’s racism and

classism exist both at and within its borders. Most of the people in county

jails for unpaid traff‌ic tickets are Black and Brown.

1

The fees for the H-1B

visa (commonly referred to as the work visa) and naturalization through mar-

riage, two of the main pathways to citizenship, are so excessive that the only

message received by immigrants is: “Stay out.”

These fees originate from different areas of the law but still communi-

cate the same idea: immigrants, poor, Black, and Brown people are

unwanted in America. If unpaid, these fees combined prevent immi-

grants, poor, Black, and Brown people from driving to work, maintaining

medical appointments, taking their children to school, walking the

streets, marrying the love of their lives, and working to provide for their

basic needs. The American system uses every opportunity to create

unnecessary barriers for their progress and oppresses them enough to

make them regret their birth or coming to America. This paper examines

how the use of f‌ines and fees in the United States reinforces those barriers

and communicates that people of color and immigrants are unwanted in

America. This paper specif‌ically discusses the impact of f‌ines and fees

for traff‌ic violations on Black Americans as well as the use of excessive

f‌ines and fees in immigration and naturalization—ultimately arguing that

both systems result in the intentional exclusion of Black Americans and

immigrants in the United States.

II. NOT THE PERSON OF COLOR, DEFINITELY NOT THE BLACK MAN

America does not want the Black man. Black people fought for every

basic right: to be recognized as human,

2

to be taught,

3

to vote,

4

to receive

medical attention,

5

to live in adequate housing,

6

and, relevant to this

1. “For example, of the 10 states with the highest black–white differential in incarceration in state

prisons, f‌ive (Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, Illinois, and Nebraska) are in the Midwest and three of these

(Wisconsin, Iowa, and Minnesota) imprison black people at more than 10 times the rate of white people.”

Jaime Worker and Piet van Lier, Criminalization of Black and Brown Communities in the Midwest Adds

to Public Health Crisis During COVID-19 Pandemic, ECON. POLICY INST. (May 27, 2020, 4:53 PM),

https://www.epi.org/blog/criminalization-of-Black-and-Brown-communities-in-the-midwest-adds-to-public-

health-crisis-during-COVID-19-pandemic/.

2. See Dred Scott v. Sanford, 60 U.S. 393 (1857); see also Civil Rights Act of 1866, P.L. 122–41, 14

Stat. 27–30 (1886).

3. Brown v. Bd. of Educ. of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 (1954); see also Brown v. Bd. Of Educ. II, 349

U.S. 294 (1955).

4. Sarah Pruitt, When Did African Americans Actually Get the Right to Vote?, HISTORY (Jan. 29,

2020), https://www.history.com/news/african-american-voting-right-15th-amendment; see also Civil

Rights Act of 1964, https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/civil_rights/civil_rights.htm (last

visited Nov. 7, 2020).

5. John McDonough, Looking Back on the Desegregation of U.S. Hospitals in 1966, HEALTH STEW

(Mar. 24, 2018), https://healthstew.com/2018/03/24/looking-back-on-the-desegregation-of-u-s-hospitals-

in-1966/; Soc. Sec. Act Amendments (1965), https://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?f‌lash=false&doc=

99.

6. Fair Housing Act, HISTORY (Sept. 12, 2018), https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/fair-

housing-act.

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