On June 1st a passport will be needed to cross the Mexico/US border instead of just a birth certificate and driver’s license, an immigration regulation that disproportionately affects Latinos. From the Associated Press:
The citizenship of hundreds, possibly thousands, of people who insist they are Americans is being called into question because they were delivered by midwives near the U.S.-Mexico border. The federal government’s doubts have arisen as many people in the border region try to meet a June 1 deadline to obtain U.S. passports so they can freely cross from one country to the other.
Xenophobic and racist anti-immigration policies have made obtaining a U.S. passport a long and difficult process, even with all the necessary paperwork and documentation. As we reported in August of last year, the citizenship status of many Latinos who were born in the U.S. near the border with Mexico is being questioned despite proper documentation; these individuals are being forced to provide further proof of citizenship simply because they were delivered by midwives outside of hospitals.
From a reproductive justice perspective, this practice completely undermines the role of the midwife and reinforces the medicalization of women’s bodies by making hospital delivery an informal prerequisite to citizenship even though the law clearly states anyone born on U.S. soil and its territories is a citizen. At least 250 midwives along the border states have been targeted.
Last year the ACLU sued the State Department on several occasions over its refusal to grant passports to citizens whose births were attended by midwives or in local clinics and are hoping to file a class action law suit over the issue.
Contributed by Marcela Villa, DC Policy Intern
When I read that story a few weeks ago, I thought of several things. First, how no one even batted an eye when I applied for a Social Security card for my daughter who was not born in a hospital. She was born 15 minutes from the Mexican border, but no one would think twice about me because I’m white.
Then I considered the profound lack of trust in midwives, especially independent midwives, which made me want to research what was happening historically when birth in the U.S. made the final leap to institutionalization. I had never considered the impact of institutional birth on the sovereignty of the individual, nor had it entered my mind that hospital birth is one way to witness the birth of a new citizen to make sure that it really happened within U.S. borders.
The majority of urban births were in a hospital by the end of the 30′s. Blue Cross insurance plans began in the 30′s. Health examiners began convincing Americans that they were chronically unhealthy. Institutionalized birth was clearly a Depression-era business opportunity. The government cut immigration in the 20’s, 30’s and 40’s. It makes me wonder if maybe the government played any role in marketing or promoting giving birth in a hospital because of the obvious benefit of registering future taxpayers and soldiers, as well as verifying the presence of desired/undesired new citizens born on American soil.
Thank you for writing about this Marcela. This is an issue that hits at so many women from different angles. As you said it is racism, xenophobia and the continued medicalization of women’s bodies. The denigration by the government and the medical industries of the health and rights of women of color (and poor women) has had a longstanding hold on our uteruses. A suffocating hold that continues today, despite medical evidence that births at home, attended by midwives are more safe and result in far fewer cesarean births.