Reporting on ICE Means Centering Immigrant Voices, Especially With $75 Billion at Stake

Who reports on ICE—and how—shapes not just public perceptions of immigrants, but the civic fabric of New York itself.

Around the corner from any Queens bodega or Bronx day-labour queue, the quiet impact of immigration enforcement carries flesh-and-blood consequences. In 2025, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) saw its budget surge with a $75 billion supplemental allocation—enough, by government reckoning, to make its presence in American cities like New York all but permanent for the rest of the decade. For reporters tasked with explaining what “enforcement” means on city streets, it poses a perennial question: who gets to tell these stories, and what happens when their vantage point is as overlooked as those they chronicle?

At newsrooms like Feet in 2 Worlds, a non-profit outlet run by journalists from immigrant backgrounds, the reporting mandate has long exceeded mere “capital-I Immigration” policy. Their features range from immigrant perspectives on climate change to family, housing and food—putting faces and context to issues that, for most New Yorkers, are never as abstract as the headlines. But the city’s everyday churn has shifted; as ICE enforcement intensifies, these journalists find themselves compelled to return, again and again, to the stark drama of raids and removals.

The newsroom’s editorial judgement is clear: the voices shaping coverage must come from the communities most affected. “Stories of immigration policy and enforcement inherently impact immigrants,” argues Quincy Surasmith, Feet in 2 Worlds’ managing editor. Immigrant reporters, he contends, possess both linguistic fluency and cultural knowledge necessary to capture nuance lost on outsiders—a kind of journalistic “access key” to narratives otherwise muffled or oversimplified.

As ICE operations move from the shadows and onto busy Gotham avenues, their visibility breeds new anxieties and politicises daily life. Encounters between federal agents and city residents—whether witnessed in bustling Jackson Heights or whispered about over WhatsApp in Flatbush—fuel uncertainty that ripples far beyond those directly targeted. The editorial test, then, is twofold: Can newsrooms report on enforcement without stoking panic? And can they resist the temptation to flatten immigrant communities to mere victims or, worse, mere statistics?

For New York, the country’s emblem of pluralism (with more than one third of residents foreign-born), such questions have immediate consequence. Overly simplistic or sensational coverage threatens not just journalistic standards but the fragile trust between immigrant communities and public institutions. As federal budgets swell, some city organises, such as mutual-aid groups and legal clinics, brace for what looks likely to be a protracted “era of enforcement”—while hoping that the local press will reflect, rather than distort, their lived realities.

Reporter make-up matters; according to the logic of Feet in 2 Worlds and similar groups, the best journalism about enforcement comes from within. This is not simply activism in disguise. Familiarity with community norms, language, and internal debates allows reporters to challenge official narratives, humanise the bureaucratic machinery, and reveal those shades of resilience and agency officials often ignore.

The broader implications for New York lie not in the drama of headline raids, but in the more subtle erosion of civic participation. As immigration enforcement becomes omnipresent, fewer immigrants attend public meetings or seek municipal services. Misinformation—distorted both by social media conspiracy and incomplete coverage—flourishes in the vacuum. The task for the city’s press corps, then, is as much about explaining as investigating: separating police action from rumour, fact from fear.

Who holds the pen, and why it matters

For the local economy, the stakes are plain. New York’s post-pandemic recovery depends on a robust workforce—much of which is immigrant, often working in sectors (from restaurants to home care) acutely sensitive to shifting federal policy. When ICE activity ramps up and is reported without nuance, the economic jitters are not mere abstractions for business owners or customers. Workers may avoid shifts, business may slow, and an undercurrent of mistrust begins to permeate the city’s daily commerce.

There are political echoes, too: mayoral administrations—regardless of their ideological stripe—must strike a delicate balance between upholding the city’s “sanctuary” stance and responding to the realities imposed by federal agencies awash with cash and political backing. If local media fail in their watchdog and explanatory roles, the space for rational civic debate narrows, and policy is made as much by anecdote and agitation as by data.

Nationally and globally, the New York story is a bellwether. Immigrant-focused journalism in the city can influence not just municipal policy but also the national discourse around enforcement and belonging. International cities—from London to Toronto—have contended with their own versions of this dilemma: to what extent should reporting be “by and for” affected communities, and how do mainstream outlets maintain credibility in a world increasingly sceptical of outsiders narrating the inside story?

It is tempting, in times of tension, for both large newsrooms and their consumers to default to hackneyed tropes: “good” versus “bad” migrants, faceless bureaucracy versus endangered locals. And yet, as New York’s polyglot media ecosystem hints, the reality is more untidy—and the reporting gains heft when contributions come from many directions, not just parachuting journalists or script-following policy wonks.

What can be said for certain is this: the quality of ICE coverage, and the diversity of those reporting it, offers a proxy for the city’s broader self-understanding. When the people who live through policies are empowered to interpret them, the news grows less abstract and more analytical; data and lived experience mash together in ways that, though sometimes discomforting, are essential to civic literacy.

At times, letting those most familiar with the story do the reporting can seem almost radical. But in the end, it is not a concession so much as common sense. New Yorkers may debate the merits of enforcement or sanctuary, but none should doubt that who tells the story is as vital as what is being told.

A city that listens—and allows all its residents to speak for themselves—has the best chance of ensuring its news, and its policies, serve more than just the loudest voices. ■