"We are not criminals": social work advocacy and unauthorized migrants

Using semistructured interviews and participant observation, this two-year pilot study of male Mexican migrants in Freehold, New Jersey, explored how day laborers perceive their struggles to support families despite escalating anti-immigrant legislation at virtually all levels of government. In particular, the author looks at efforts by Mexican migrants to contest characterizations of them as "illegal", a term that has clear connotations of criminality, and to distance themselves from others who commit crimes. Migrants questioned the moral legitimacy of U.S. immigration laws, an indicator that vigorous legal efforts to thwart their arrival could prove fruitless.This finding is critical for social work, which must find the means to serve this vulnerable population.