Criminalization of Compassion: Contentious Relationships Between Nation-Building and Immigrant Aid Workers on the U.S./Mexico Border

This paper assesses the obstacles faced by immigrant aid groups on the U.S./ Mexico border and the resiliency used to challenge these obstacles. The borderlands of the United States and Mexico is a unique landscape for activists and humanitarians to work given the prevalence and amount of entities that police the area and the suspension of certain constitutional protections. The criminalization of activists on the border provides a unique lens in understanding how social movements and nation-building are linked to immigration in the United States. This research aims to provide a rich description of what criminalization is and how it plays out between the government and activist groups along the border. My findings critique the United States and its claim that it is a liberal democracy because it breaks norms and international laws in its assault against activists and humanitarians, many of whom are U.S. citizens. This attack further demonstrates that the violence migrants endure on the border is not just an unfortunate side effect of border policies but very much intentional and by design. In addition to criminalizing activists, this thesis examines the activists’ mental health and exhaustion as they relate to their humanitarian work and how this is also intentional violence the U.S. Government inflicts in order to maintain itself as a nation-state.