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The Invisible Crisis Before Our Eyes

Written by José Quiñonez on .

Trust is foundational to everything in our lives, yet it is incredibly difficult to build. It requires intentionality. It takes time—even in the best of circumstances. And it can erode almost instantly in the grip of fear and anxiety. I have spent my entire career building trust with financially invisible communities, people pushed to the side, marginalized, hidden. At MAF, we help low-income immigrant families materially improve their financial lives not with empty slogans but with tangible products that deliver real, direct impact.

But now we are living through a moment of intense fear that is impacting the very people we’re here to help. 

Immigrant communities across this country are living through what can only be described as a campaign of terror—one designed not to enforce the law but to inflict pain. Despite the recent lack of media attention, ICE continues to hunt people who fled repression and violence, in the very country where they sought safety. Women fleeing abusive relationships. Young people seeking safety from gang violence. Families who risked everything to live free from oppressive governments are the people being targeted.

Our immigration system, with no viable pathways for legal entry, has pushed millions of people into an overwhelmed asylum system; there are 3.9 million pending cases in the U.S. today. People followed the rules. They went to points of entry. They found ways to support themselves while waiting for their day in court. They showed up for their hearings. And they’re now being punished for it: grabbed outside courthouses and worksites, taken to detention centers, and deported without due process. ICE, now fully funded and without restraints, is aggressively expanding detention centers to allow more apprehensions and longer detainments for more immigrants than ever before.

Cruelty Is the Point

The intention is clear: make life so miserable and so impossible that hope turns to despair. Burn the welcome mat outside America’s door. Close the blinds and shut the windows so no one can see in—and no one can find their way through.

Message received. People around the world are not traveling to the United States. Travel bans from 40 countries and visa bonds of up to $15,000 are imposing significant barriers and financial burdens on prospective visitors, students, and families. Over 4 million travelers chose not to visit the US between 2024 and 2025. The economic impact was immediate and devastating: $8.4 billion in losses for the tourism and hospitality industries. 

The unwelcome message is also reaching those already here, pushing many immigrants to retreat from civic life. In 2025, a KFF/NYT survey found that 41% of immigrants are worried about getting detained, and 15% are considering the impossible choice to self-deport, abandoning the lives they built, fleeing once again in fear and distress. 

Net immigration from Mexico has been effectively zero for years and may continue to decline into negative territory. That is not a policy success. That is an economic crisis that will reverberate for years to come: labor shortages are already putting pressure on many industries, including healthcare, skilled trades, manufacturing, construction, agriculture, and transportation. Doctors and nurses are missing from hospitals; construction and agricultural workers are missing from worksites. The result is longer delays for services, higher prices for goods, and lower economic growth for everyone.

Cutting off Access 

ICE is deliberate in its theater, staging a show of its terror tactics. Raids are the most visible weapon in this campaign. The military-style uniforms. The masks. The unmarked cars. The viral videos, staged for maximum psychological impact. The goal is not just to remove people—it is to ensure everyone sees it happen, so that contagious fear does the rest of the work. 

What is less visible is a coordinated, quiet assault on their financial lives, implementing policies that exclude people from employment, financial services, business capital, and public resources.  

  • Bureaucratic inaction at DHS is causing immigrants to lose status and work permits. The time to process a DACA renewal application grew from 15 days in 2025 to 70+ days today, leaving recipients without valid work permits and putting their employment at risk. 
  • Earlier this year, DHS proposed a policy that would effectively end work authorization for asylum applicants, denying them the opportunity and means to support themselves while their applications are processed. 
  • The Small Business Administration is now restricting loans to U.S. citizens only, cutting off legal immigrants, permanent residents, and visa holders who have long been engines of economic growth, creating over a third of new businesses in 2023.
  • The CFPB is now allowing financial institutions to consider immigration status as a risk factor, jeopardizing financial inclusion initiatives, closing individual accounts, and pushing families further into the shadows.
  • 4.5 million U.S. citizen children are disqualified from tax credits simply because their parents file a tax return using an ITIN, depriving families who need them most of precious resources. 
  • Safety net programs have been out of reach for millions of immigrant families. Now, even “No Taxes on Tips” and other tax deductions meant to help low-income, working families are available only to tax filers with an SSN. Mixed-status families are excluded from such benefits, denied even the least of resources. 
  • 2.7 million Social Security beneficiaries were very close to being moved into a death file by DOGE. The cascade of harm this would have caused is almost unimaginable. People who are very much alive would have had their access to banking and financial accounts completely cut off, causing havoc in their financial lives. How close were we to such a depraved policy? 

This Is Not Invisible. We See It.

None of this is accidental. None of it is inevitable. This is a policy choice. A deliberate, systematic effort to make life unlivable for an entire population—not just undocumented, but also mixed-status families, legal residents, and even U.S. citizens caught in the crossfire.

At MAF, we believe everyone deserves access to safe, affordable financial services—that financial dignity is not a privilege but a right. The families we serve work hard, pay taxes, and contribute immeasurably to society; they are essential workers, the backbone of our economy. They are not invisible to us.

Trust, once broken, takes time to rebuild. The damage being done right now will echo for years, if not generations. It will take people of good will to show up consistently with real solutions for those most affected: immigrant families facing the greatest odds, struggling with less access and more uncertainty. 

At MAF, we are hopeful and determined, partnering with funders, allies, and advocates to change the odds by providing capital to entrepreneurs shut out of mainstream financing, creating financial products grounded in dignity and inclusion rather than suspicion, and keeping the doors of opportunity and possibility widely open. 

We refuse to look away. This is the time to show up and do more.