From the Arkansas Advocate:
Rosita Lopez has been a community organizer for more than 15 years and said she’s never seen neighbors banding together to support immigrants like they have recently.
When stores and restaurants closed nationwide in January to protest the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, many Arkansas businesses could not afford to do so because they’d already been shuttered for days following a severe winter storm that prompted a state of emergency.
Instead, several reopened and donated thousands to immigrant advocacy groups who provide a variety of services, including translating legal materials into multiple languages.
“The sheer amount of support and the willingness of businesses to really say what they stand for, it was really beautiful to see that,” Lopez said.
The experience highlighted how Arkansans are supporting the work of grassroots groups that formed in response to the national immigration crackdown and are adapting to immigrants’ needs amid rapidly changing policies.
Northwest Arkansas, which has one of the state’s larger immigrant populations, is home to Alliance for Immigrant Respect and Education or AIRE. Over the last year, the group has focused on education and advocacy by sharing information, such as how to interact with law enforcement or set up a power of attorney.
The volunteer-led group also manages a hotline for reporting sightings of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. Similar efforts have emerged throughout the country and have been particularly active in Minnesota and the Pacific Northwest.
AIRE recently launched an initiative to deliver groceries to immigrants afraid to drive because of increased law enforcement in Springdale, one the state’s most diverse cities.
Northwest Arkansas is home to immigrants from around the world, including Latin America, southeast Asia and the Marshall Islands. About 14% of Benton and Washington County residents are foreign born, according to 2024 U.S. Census Bureau estimates.
Lopez, a member of AIRE’s leadership team, said despite the fear and anxiety within the immigrant community, “there’s also that bit of hope that people are really starting to understand what is happening.”
President Donald Trump’s second term has been punctuated by increased ICE activity nationwide that’s resulted in protests, violence, calls for reform and a partial government shutdown.
The administration announced this month it would wind down its unprecedented immigration enforcement in Minneapolis, but ICE agents remain and fears about ongoing deportations and detentions continue.
Several Arkansas businesses that stayed open on the nationwide shutdown day donated to AIRE, who will use the money to support its work, which includes translating materials into Spanish, Marshallese, Arabic and Korean, Lopez said.
The most challenging part of helping immigrants be prepared, she said, has been staying on top of policies because “this administration is constantly changing it up on us.”
In Arkansas, one such change resulted from a 2025 state law that requires the Division of Correction and county sheriffs to participate in the federal 287(g) program, which allows state and local law enforcement to perform specific immigration duties.
The law requires participation in one model of the 287(g) program that permits local law enforcement to serve administrative warrants on immigrants in their custody.
Arkansas State Police entered an agreement to participate in a different model of the 287(g) program that allows them to enforce limited immigration authority during their routine police duties.
These partnerships have increased immigration enforcement in Arkansas without bringing more ICE agents to the state, according to Cynthia Martínez, field director for Intransitive, a central Arkansas organization that supports transgender Arkansans, especially migrants of color.
Transgender immigrants are among the most vulnerable to persecution and violence, and often have limited support systems, according to Advocates for Trans Equality, a national civil rights group.
Following Trump’s election, Intransitive expanded its support to all migrants with the launch of its immigration-focused initiative, Migra Watch.
With state law enforcement’s new immigration authority, Martínez said migrants are often detained while driving. Arkansas State Police Director Col. Mike Hagar recently told lawmakers that 48 people have been held on immigration detainers since September due to state police’s participation in the federal immigration program.
“For me personally, it seems like why did it have to get this bad for more people to become engaged. We’ve been saying this for years. It’s been bad for years and it had to get this bad for a lot of people to start paying attention.”
– Rosita Lopez, a member of AIRE's leadership team
Since launching Migra Watch last year, Intransitive has created a volunteer-run ICE sightings hotline, hosted educational meetings and accompanied migrants to ICE check-ins and immigration and traffic court.
The group’s main focus has been deportation defense, which includes helping people who’ve been detained by connecting them with a lawyer or raising money for bond, Martínez said.
One goal of the group’s work has been building “a culture of participatory community defense” where people don’t have to be part of a formal group, but they can feel knowledgeable enough to support their immigrant neighbors, she said.
The intention of current immigration enforcement is to create fear and anxiety, but families shouldn’t give up when a loved one is detained, Martínez said.
“As much as it does feel very like they’re hunting us…and maybe it almost feels inevitable that they’re going to come for all of us, but to just not lose hope and know that there have been family members who’ve been able to come out,” she said.
Highlighting the impact of immigration enforcement in the state is a priority for Arkansas GRITA. Short for Grassroots Initiative for Transparency and Accountability, Arkansas GRITA is a community-led journalism project that launched in January.
Editor and researcher Olivia Paschal, a Rogers native currently earning her doctorate in Virginia, said she’s working with Arkansas-based journalists focused on reporting investigative and data stories. Paschal has written about labor and capitalism in Arkansas, and produced articles for Facing South about the effects of the pandemic on poultry workers, many of whom are immigrants.
“We wanted to give people the tools they need to hold public officials and the system accountable,” Paschal said. “You can’t do that without having the basic information about what’s going on from a trustworthy place.”
Northwest Arkansas is the current focus of the volunteer-led newsroom, but Paschal said they hope to expand to statewide coverage. Arkansas GRITA is also partnering with Chikin Melele, a Marshallese-focused newspaper.
Thousands of immigrants from the Marshall Islands began immigrating to Northwest Arkansas in the 1980s, a migration that stemmed from the devastation caused by the United States’ nuclear testing near the islands. Arkansas has the largest Marshallese population in the country, with many finding work in poultry and other processing operations.
Having more news outlets in the state provides more places for people to tell stories they want to or that need to be told, Paschal said.
When there’s only a handful of people or organizations, “the discourse is limited because you don’t have a wide range of stories being told because there’s no capacity,” she said.
Organizations like Arkansas GRITA are popping up because “people are responding to a moment of crisis where there’s a lack of information, there’s a lack of organization and there’s real needs,” Paschal said.
While larger immigrant-focused groups have existed for years, Lopez said smaller grassroots organizations can provide a level of trust that’s sometimes missing from larger groups. As members of the communities they’re serving, the smaller organizations better understand local nuances and dynamics, Lopez said.
Fighting together for your community and advocating for those who can’t advocate for themselves are lessons Lopez said her mother instilled in her at a young age.
Though she’s grateful to Arkansans rallying to support their immigrant neighbors, Lopez lamented the seriousness of the situation.
“For me personally, it seems like why did it have to get this bad for more people to become engaged,” she said. “We’ve been saying this for years. It’s been bad for years and it had to get this bad for a lot of people to start paying attention.”
