2018 was an incredibly difficult year for immigrants, immigrant family members, immigrant rights advocates, and immigration lawyers.

So what might 2019 hold?  Will immigration affairs remain bleak or will daylight start to shine again?

How should immigrants play their cards?

Editor’s Note: If you would like to read immigration predictions for 2019, see this article: Five Immigrant Rights Activists Share Their Predictions For 2019.

By Chasity Alvarez

As 2018 begins, there are several issues which all immigrants and their families will need to face in the coming year.

Before jumping in, I would first like to address a point raised by President Trump last year.

In Immigration LIVE, Episode 6, we spent time with Marguerita Jane Dentino, Executive Director of Casa Freehold, a leading non-profit organization in the ongoing social war to protect immigrant rights.  We asked her about how the possibility and the reality of family separation affects the children of immigrants.

The ordeal of migrants from Central and South America is a dangerous journey.

Yet, thousands make this trip every year, often with limited, if any food, clothes, money, or water.

Few really understand the ordeals they face like Joel Smith, Director of Operations at Human Borders, a Tucson, Arizona non- profit organization dedicated to taking death out of the immigration border equation.

One of the toughest issues to understand is why would millions of Latin Americans leave their homes families to make an illegal, expensive, dangerous and sometimes deadly journey to the United States?

To the extent this issue is discussed in the public arena, it is usually explored at a surface level, without a deep exploration of the causes or consequences of such migration.

This lack of truth and honesty prompted Ellin Jimmerson, a minister and civil rights activist, with a Ph.D in History, to produce “The Second Cooler”, an award-winning documentary on the immigration problems caused by NAFTA.

Open any newspaper, listen to any talk show, or watch any television show on immigration, and you’ll hear about immigrants crossing the border from Mexico to enter the United States.

The American public rarely, if ever, hears about U.S. citizens crossing the border to live in Mexico. However, our immigration live hangout special guest today provides that perspective for you.

Meet Bob Drews, one of the most prolific immigration commentators on the internet.

Bob regularly posts articles, news stories, and reports, adding his unabashed opinions on immigration affairs in Unjust Legal Immigration Laws And The Rights Of All People, a grassroots group of over 8,000 active followers on Facebook.

In this chat, you will learn why Bob is not happy with either the U.S. media or the U.S. government on issues near and dear to his heart.

When President Obama was elected to his first term, immigrant communities felt reform was just around the corner. Instead, his administration has deported nearly 200,000 individuals per year.

Many of these deportees have deep family roots and community ties. Over 85% lack any serious or violent criminal convictions. The combination of these factors has led to widespread dissent about our nation’s detention and deportation policies.

The more immigration law enforcement agencies have pushed to remove immigrants from their families, the more they have created a new wave of immigration reform activists – citizen activists who refuse to sit idly while the rights of their friends and neighbors are trampled upon by agents claiming to be acting under authority of law.

It was this type of government abuse which prompted Deborah Sherman de Santos to start questioning immigration officials. That was several years ago. She is still seeking answers today.

There is little doubt that keeping mixed status families together is one of the most pressing issues facing immigration reform advocates today.

This is why we invited Chasity Brewster Alvarez, founder of Fair Unity, to be our first guest on Batara Immigration Live.

Over the course of a few months, Chasity went from being a spouse of an undocumented immigrant with no knowledge about immigration issues to the leader of one of the internet’s largest immigrant family support groups.