The United States is experiencing a renewed period of immigration and immigrant policy activity as well as heightened enforcement of such policies. This intensified activity can affect various aspects of immigrant health, including mental health. We use the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation 2015 Latino National Health and Immigration Survey ( = 1,493) to examine the relationship between immigration and immigrant policy and Latino health and well-being. We estimate a series of categorical regression models and find that there are negative health consequences associated with Latinos' perceptions of living in states with unfavorable anti-immigration laws, including reporting poor health and problems with mental health. This article builds on the work of public health scholars who have found a link between this heightened policy environment and the mental health of immigrants, yet expands on this research by finding that the health consequences associated with immigration policy extend to Latinos broadly, not just immigrants. These findings are relevant to scholars of immigration and health policy as well as policy makers who should consider these negative effects on the immigrant community during their decision-making process.

As COVID-19 cases continue to increase across the country, there is a concern about the extent to which this pandemic will affect students. Since March 2020, schools transitioned to a distance-learning format, which unintentionally forced parents into new teaching roles as proxy educators. In this brief, we explore the association between distance learning and the mental health of proxy educators. We find that parents with children who struggled with distance learning experienced elevated mental distress. Given the relationship between teacher burnout and student outcomes, we argue the importance of supporting parents during this time to improve students’ schooling.

Using the 2015 Latino National Health and Immigration Survey (N= 1,197) we examine the relationship between physical and mental health status and three multidimensional measures of race: 1) “street race,” or how you believe other “Americans” perceive your race at the level of the street; 2) socially assigned race or what we call “ascribed race,” which refers to how you believe others usually classify your race in the U.S.; and 3) “self-perceived race,” or how you usually self-classify your race on questionnaires. We engage in intersectional inquiry by combining street race and gender. We find that only self-perceived race correlates with physical health and that street race is associated with mental health. We also find that men reporting their street race as Latinx1 or Arab were associated with higher odds of reporting worse mental health outcomes. One surprising finding was that, for physical health, men reporting their street race as Latinx were associated with higher odds of reporting optimal physical health. Among women, those reporting their street race as Mexican were associated with lower odds of reporting optimal physical health when compared to all other women; for mental health status, however, we found no differences among women. We argue that “street race” is a promising multidimensional measure of race for exploring inequality among Latinxs.

As Congress priorities the immigration debate on increased border security, the fate of an estimated 11 million undocumented citizens remains uncertain. Stuck in between partisan politics and practical solutions are mixed-status families in which some members of the family are U.S. citizens while other members are in the country without proper authorization. This paper, examines the relationship between risk of deportation and Medicaid use drawing from a nationally sample of mothers from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Survey. These data are then merged with data from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services to create a contextual risk of deportation measure. Findings suggest that an increase in risk of deportation is associated with a decrease in Medicaid use. The implications of this work have tremendous impacts for health service providers and policy makers interested in preventing and reducing health disparities in complex family structures.

Objective Develop and test measures of risk of deportation and mixed-status families on WIC uptake. Mixed-status is a situation in which some family members are U.S. citizens and other family members are in the U.S. without proper authorization. Methods Estimate a series of logistic regressions to estimate WIC uptake by merging data from Fragile Families and Child Well-being Survey with deportation data from U.S.-Immigration Customs and Enforcement. Results The findings of this study suggest that risk of deportation is negatively associated with WIC uptake and among mixed-status families; Mexican origin families are the most sensitive when it comes to deportations and program use. Conclusion Our analysis provides a typology and framework to study mixed-status families and evaluate their usage of social services by including an innovative measure of risk of deportation.