Welcoming in the News
Here are some media coverage highlights to inspire and inform your own community’s welcoming movement.
Featured News
A More Welcoming American Dream
That work of building a common American Dream starts in communities, where neighbors of all stripes can get to work on common projects. The cooperation we see during times of natural disaster show us that this possible.
Anchorage embraces role as welcoming city
Anchorage is proud of its heritage and poised to be a globally competitive, culturally vibrant community ready to take on the opportunities and challenges we face at the edge of the Arctic.
Gearing up for Census 2020
As lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of the decision move forward, localities can and should act now to ensure a fair and accurate count, by engaging stakeholders and communicating the importance of a complete count to local residents, particularly those – like immigrants – at risk of an undercount.
News Archive
Rachel Peric: Ohio Rewarded For Embracing Immigrants
Ohio has long served as a microcosm of the United States. At a time of rising fears about immigrants and demographic change, these pragmatic efforts rooted in local values offer a counterpoint to the vitriol.
Rust Belt Needs Legal Immigration
President Trump supports a plan that would halve the number of newcomers—and cut off the Midwest’s “demographic lifeline.”
Code the Dream in Durham helps immigrant and refugee communities give back and diversify tech world
A Code the Dream program is helping to steer people from immigrant, refugee and minority communities into computer programming jobs and tech careers. The classes are being offered through Uniting NC, a Welcoming America member, and the American Underground, a startup incubator.
As United States cracks down on refugee resettlement, the ‘Ellis Island of the South’ keeps open arms
Clarkston, Georgia’s, streets are dotted with community centers and immigrant and refugee-owned businesses. “The future is going to look more diverse, more ethnically complex,” Mayor Ted Terry said. “If we can make that work in Clarkston, then it gives me hope for the rest of the world.”
Global Cleveland spotlighting immigrant and refugee-owned businesses
Global Cleveland is spotlighting Northeast Ohio's international entrepreneurs by compiling and promoting a directory of more than 75 local restaurants, shops, and businesses started by immigrants and refugees. The list is the first of its kind in Greater Cleveland.
Americans are welcomers, not wall-builders
Although the expansion of intolerance and xenophobia in America today is disturbing and, unfortunately, familiar, there is a counter-narrative that has also run through our history as a nation. This is the story of the “Welcomers,” those who have led the charge for inclusion — be it of immigrants, African Americans, Jews, LGBT-Americans, or the many other groups who have faced prejudice and persecution in our country.
Immigrants are bolstering the Pittsburgh metro area population
Without an influx of international migration to the Pittsburgh metro area, the region would have lost 36,580 residents since 2010. This would have been far and away the largest population decline of any large U.S. metro area over that time span. Luckily, enough people came across borders to the Steel City, drastically cutting into the figure, and stemming some the region’s population decline.
Immigrants revitalize Detroit
Immigration has been quietly powering the population growth, neighborhood revitalization, innovation, entrepreneurship, and broad diversity upon which a bright future for Detroit’s neighborhoods and current residents can be secured. Not only do immigrants in Detroit make up an outsized percentage of the self-employed but they are also preventing the city’s population from shrinking.
Photo series highlights success of welcoming initiative in Dayton, OH
Dayton has long been considered an immigrant-friendly community. In the mid-1990s, Dayton helped end the Bosnian War with peace talks. In 2010, then-Dayton Mayor Gary Leitzell and a Turkish native started the Welcome Dayton initiative. In 2017, a local photographer decided to turn the lens on immigrants in Dayton to hear from them about how they’ve been welcomed in the city.
Why Houston is becoming more accepting of immigration
The continued growth in positive attitudes toward immigrants is thanks largely to a younger generation of Houstonians that is more diverse and more comfortable with diversity than older generations. For example, 37 percent of the baby boom generation and 35 percent of Gen Xers felt immigration into the country mostly threatens American culture, but only 13 percent of millennials agreed.
Hamtramck, MI: An evolving city of immigrants
Pick a street corner in downtown Hamtramck, Mich., and you'll be struck by the incredible mix of cultures crammed into this tiny, 2-square-mile city. What has united all of the immigrant groups who've come to Hamtramck? Good jobs in the auto industry. Hamtramck is surrounded by Detroit, and for decades, car manufacturing was its lifeblood.
Trump may not want immigrants, but Rust Belt mayors do
In the suburbs and countryside of Rust Belt swing states, President Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant message may have carried the day, but in the region’s post-industrial cities, it’s anathema. Mayors from Detroit to Cleveland -- as well as northeastern cities like Albany, NY, and Lowell, MA -- see financial salvation in immigrants and are dismayed by Trump’s drive to tighten the borders.