We Cannot Recover From the Los Angeles Fires Without the Help of Immigrants

In the week after deadly wildfires swept across the Los Angeles area, dozens of day laborers and volunteers have been gathering at the Pasadena Community Job Center to clean debris and hand out aid to people displaced by the fires.

“If you watch the mainstream news, you’ll see a lot of stories about people who are looting,” an immigrant volunteer said in a video published on X by the Party For Socialism and Liberation. “But what we’re seeing out here is stories of people who are helping each other and showing up for their community.”

Still, these stories haven’t stopped the churn of disinformation. Earlier this month, President Donald Trump went on a tirade bashing California Governor Gavin Newsom and other “California pols” on Truth Social. On X, Elon Musk parroted the false rightwing theory that the Los Angeles Fire Department’s diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives were to blame for the disaster, writing in one post that “they prioritized DEI over saving lives and saving homes.” U.S. Representative Andy Biggs, Republican of Arizona, falsely claimed that disaster relief funds are going to “undocumented migrants.” And after Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum sent a fleet of Mexican firefighters to help Angelenos put out the blaze earlier this month, far right commentators accused the United States government of not using American firefighters, instead. 

But as the far right contorts its lies on every possible platform, scapegoating immigrants to distract their viewers from acknowledging the climate crisis unfolding in real time, immigrants tell a different story. “You don’t have to be a U.S. citizen or have legal papers to help someone,” an immigrant volunteer in Los Angeles told NPR. “When you help someone, you strengthen your union with them. When you stop and ask if they could use a hand, they remember that.”

Luis Sandoval, the executive director of the Building Skills Partnership, says that many of the immigrant workers that he works with are volunteering, even when they’ve also been affected by the fires. 

“Lots of these workers work in these high-end, multi-million dollar homes as service workers, gardeners and whatnot,” Sandoval tells The Progressive. “Now they’re facing the fact that they don’t have a job.”

Building Skills Partnership works with SEIU-USWW, employers, industry leaders, and community members to empower janitors, stadium workers, and airport workers across California through workforce development, immigrant inclusion, and community advancement programs. In the last couple weeks, the organization and its members have mobilized to help those affected by the fires. 

“You see a lot of people going to the frontlines to bring their skills and passion for their communities to help their neighbors,” he continues. “And they don’t go in with ‘I’m an immigrant’—they go in with, ‘I’m your neighbor.’ ”

Immigrants in the United States have a long history of being the first to respond to natural disasters across the country. Immigrants are often also the first to take on the equally dangerous—and essential—job of cleaning up and rebuilding in the aftermath of disasters, even travelling from state to state to take on this work. 

After Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the Bush Administration waived certain immigration laws to take advantage of immigrant labor. As a result, more than 50 percent of the workers who removed more than thirty-eight million cubic yards of debris and installed new roofs and sheetrock on buildings were immigrants—and almost half of them were undocumented. In addition to exposure to mold and other toxins, many of these immigrants experienced wage theft at the hands of abusive bosses who leveraged their immigration status against them. 

Immigrants were also some of the first to arrive at Ground Zero mere hours after the September 11 attacks. For months, they exposed themselves to jet fuel, pulverized cement, lead, and asbestos,  risking their lives to help clear the debris and return New York City’s Financial District back to livable conditions as quickly as possible. Now, many of them suffer from “World Trade Center Syndrome”—the moniker given to the coughs and lasting respiratory illnesses that many of the first responders on 9/11 suffer from their repeated exposure to toxic materials. Many have never sought medical attention out of fear of being deported.  

In 2012, undocumented day laborers rebuilt New York and New Jersey in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, often exposing themselves to toxic debris and mold from cleaning homes with flooded basements. Five years later, immigrants helped Houston get back on its feet after Hurricane Harvey. Like those who rebuilt in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, they worked long hours in grueling conditions, often without proper safety precautions. More recently, immigrants risked their lives amid the COVID-19 pandemic to provide medical care to sick people, keep grocery shelves stocked, sanitize businesses, and deliver food. More than five million of the essential immigrants who kept the United States running through the peak of the pandemic were undocumented.

This story will undoubtedly repeat itself in Los Angeles, where 43 percent of the construction industry is comprised of immigrant workers. But instead of acknowledging immigrants’ historic contributions to the country in times of crisis, Trump has repeatedly promised a “mass deportation” campaign that will target the very communities that have mobilized to rebuild the United States in the wake of natural disasters, time and time again. 

“L.A. County is anchored by immigrant families and immigrant workers,” Sandoval says. “When you think about the relief, the long-term rebuilding, it’ll be these workers rebuilding.”