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Advocates in New Bedford are bracing for the impact of a ban on immigrant visas from 75 nations announced Jan. 14 by the Trump administration and effective as of Wednesday.
The ban will stop all immigrant visa processing from a list of 75 countries, including Cabo Verde and Guatemala, two countries that make up a significant portion of New Bedford’s population. The ban does not apply to nonimmigrant visas such as those for tourists and students.
Helena DaSilva Hughes, president of the Immigrants’ Assistance Center, said she recently visited an English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) class at the center and word had filtered to the students through social media.
“They are very sad,” DaSilva Hughes said, noting the 15 or so students hailed from Cabo Verde, Guatemala, and Senegal. “They feel like they’re being targeted.”
In a statement to The Washington Post, the State Department justified the move as a way to reduce public charges, a term meant to include those receiving public assistance or benefits.
“The Trump administration is bringing an end to the abuse of America’s immigration system by those who would extract wealth from the American people,” U.S. State Department spokesman Tommy Pigott told The Post.
Those words rang hollow to Darlene Spencer, president of the Cape Verdean Association in New Bedford.
“We’re very hardworking people,” she said. “Looking at the entire community, the community itself has been very hardworking and makes sure it’s contributing to society.”
Many Cabo Verdeans in New Bedford trace their lineage in the city back to the heyday of the whaling industry, when ships stopped in the African archipelago, then a Portuguese colony, to resupply and often replace crew members.
The islands continue to send a stream of immigrants to the area. There were almost 48,000 Cabo Verdean immigrants living in the U.S. in 2024, according to the Migration Policy Institute. Estimates place their proportion of the city’s population at about 10%.
According to data from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, 11,118 Cabo Verdeans became naturalized citizens and 13,556 became legal permanent residents between fiscal 2016 and fiscal 2023, the most recent data available.
“It’s prejudice toward not only our country but other countries of color,” Spencer said. “It’s a shame that the president is doing what he’s doing and I think it’s going to have a large impact on our community.”
The Guatemalan community in New Bedford has been especially hard-hit by the mass deportation campaign. The Light has been able to confirm that more than 65 people arrested by federal agents since January 2025 were living in or present in the Greater New Bedford area. The majority of them are Indigenous Guatemalan men.
Even with that impact, Tiana Ochoa, president of the board of directors for the Guatemalan Center of New England, said her homeland’s inclusion on the list still caught her off guard.
“It is surprising to hear that Guatemala and some other Central American countries were put on a list,” she said. “I don’t know if we’ve ever been put on a list like this before.”
As of 2024, there were almost 1.4 million Guatemalan immigrants in the U.S., according to the Migration Policy Institute. That trend began in the 1980s, when government forces carried out a genocide, killing roughly 200,000 people, most of them Indigenous, during that nation’s civil war. The largest estimates for Guatemalans in New Bedford place the population at 6,000, though advocates believe that to be an undercount.
“I would think New Bedford should be concerned about it,” Ochoa said, “and Guatemalans across the New England region.”
According to DHS data from fiscal 2016 to 2023, 74,694 Guatemalan immigrants became naturalized U.S. citizens and 104,690 became legal permanent residents. Unlike Cabo Verdeans, a significant number of Guatemalans enter the U.S. as refugees and asylum seekers.
There were 2,900 Guatemalans who entered the U.S. between fiscal 2021 and fiscal 2023 as refugees, according to DHS. In that same time span, there were almost 97,000 cases of Guatemalans seeking asylum. (Some cases may be duplicated in the data.)
“The larger issue here is that immigration policy should reflect dignity and humanity,” Ochoa said. “We’re certainly not seeing that.”
Family reunification impacted
All of the advocates who spoke with The Light said the new policy will severely limit family reunification, a long-held goal of many immigrants to the U.S.
“One of the many reasons that people have green cards and become U.S. citizens is because they want to petition for children to come from their native countries,” DaSilva Hughes said. “Now that they’re not going to be allowed in, it’s going to impact families tremendously.”
Ochoa shared the sentiment.
“There are so many layers to how this impacts people and it isolates people,” she said. “This may keep families from being able to spend time together.
“It just feels overwhelming, the more these decisions come to light. They are beyond our comprehension.”
Advocates see racism in list of countries affected
All three advocates argued plainly that racism motivates the policy.
“The populations that are being impacted the most are our Black and Brown communities,” DaSilva Hughes said. “I think it’s obvious if you look at the list and which countries are being impacted the most. That speaks for itself.”
The list of 75 countries includes: Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, Antigua and Barbuda, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bahamas, Bangladesh, Barbados, Belarus, Belize, Bhutan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Burma, Cambodia, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Colombia, Cote d’Ivoire, Cuba, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Dominica, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Fiji, Gambia, Georgia, Ghana, Grenada, Guatemala, Guinea, Haiti, Iran, Iraq, Jamaica, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Lebanon, Liberia, Libya, Moldova, Mongolia, Montenegro, Morocco, Nepal, Nicaragua, Nigeria, North Macedonia, Pakistan, Republic of the Congo, Russia, Rwanda, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, Tanzania, Thailand, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda, Uruguay, Uzbekistan and Yemen.
“You don’t see white countries on that list,” she added. Only seven of the 75 countries on the list are in Europe: Albania, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, and Russia. Albania and Bosnia-Herzegovina are Muslim-majority.
Ochoa said that now it is difficult to give the administration the benefit of the doubt.
“I think it’s certainly a shared sentiment across our community that we’re no longer welcome,” Ochoa said, “and it’s very explicit now.”
Kevin G. Andrade can be contacted at kandrade@newbedfordlight.org
