‘It’s Become a Deportation Mill’: A Day in the Life of an Immigration Attorney

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She’s an immigration attorney who spends six days a week telling people that they have little chance of staying in Donald Trump’s America.

“It’s become a deportation mill, and my clients have been placed on speeding rockets,” Navarrete, the daughter of a Mexican immigrant, told me at her South Gate office around 8 on a recent Monday morning.

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“Almost none of my clients have a winning case based on current law,” she continued. “’¿Si pasan reforma? [If they pass immigration reform?]’ is their most favorite question. But it’s not just Trump. It’s Stephen Miller, it’s Congress, and it’s becoming the courts.”

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“They know it’s going to create chaos for immigrants and their lawyers,” Navarrete said, looking at her long acrylic nails, which she gets done every other week as a form of self-care. “But ‘immigration’ now is just a deportation template. It feels fundamentally unfair.”

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“I can’t tell them it’s going to be OK. I don’t want to lie: It’s never been this bad,” she said. “I used to call my presentations ‘Know Your Rights’ workshops. Now, they’re just workshops, because there are no rights.”

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