President Donald Trump’s First Week: 5 Ways Metro Detroit Might Be Affected

DETROIT, MI — A pair of executive orders signed this week by President Trump — one to withhold federal block gant funding to sanctuary cities that shield undocumented immigrants, another to build a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico — are reverberating around Michigan’s largest city.

Neither action was unexpected. Immigration reform was one of the cornerstones of Trump’s campaign, but how Michigan, its residents and its business might be affected is still up in the air.

On a broader scale, a possible trade war with Mexico could have reverberations across the U.S. economy. On a human scale, the immigration crackdown and the president’s proposed “extreme vetting” of Muslims entering the United States, are furrowing the brows of many Michigan residents.

Here are five things Metro Detroit residents and auto executives said:

1. Anxiety is the constant companion of people like Jasmine Lowell, 28, who was a teeenager when her family came to the United States from Mexico, has three children, all born in America and is able to work and stay in the United States under former President Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

“We’re afraid,” told the Detroit Free Press. “We don't know what's going to happen. ... I don't know if I will be separated from my kids.”

2. Ditto that. Adonis Flores, who came to Detroit at age 9 from Guanajuato, Mexico, and is a DACA recipient, said the president’s immigration clampdown threatens to break up families. Now on the staff of Michigan United, a statewide social justice group that held a rally protesting the president’s immigration policies, said in a statement that “Trump is targeting young people who know no other country but America.

• See Also: Trump’s Policies Will Affect 4 Groups of Undocumented Immigrants

“DACA showed that immigrant youth have a tremendous amount to contribute to our country, as superb students, professionals, and leaders,” Flores said. “We’re not going backwards and we’re not going away.”

3. Members of Michigan’s significant Muslim population are worried, too. After the Michigan United rally, the Rev. Paul Perez of United Methodist Church, Detroit Conference, said in a statement that Trump’s policies are a threat to religious liberty.

“Trump’s executive orders undermines the freedom of religion guaranteed in the Constitution,” Perez said. “Our Muslim brothers and sisters, people of Abraham just like Christians and Jews, must not be singled out for ‘extreme vetting,’ whatever that means. We know it can already take two years for refugee families to be removed from danger. How many men, women and children have to drown fleeing war or die in the conflicts before we do the right thing? These hasty, inhumane orders need to be rescinded immediately.”

4. Detroit city officials don’t expect to lose millions of dollars federal funding in Trump’s crackdown on sanctuary cities and illegal immigration. “The Detroit Police Department has always cooperated with federal customs and immigration officials on law enforcement,” Alexis Wiley, the chief of staff to Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, said in a statement.

The Detroit City Council approved what is called a “Sanctuary City Ordinance” that bans immigrant profiling, but “does not contain any of the provisions to which the president’s executive order are directed,” Wiley said in the statement.

“If the definition of a sanctuary city is one in which people are not profiled because of their appearance, Detroit is a sanctuary city,” the statement continued. “If the definition of a sanctuary city is one in which local law enforcement refuses to cooperate with federal customs and immigration officials, Detroit is not a sanctuary city.

“Whatever label is used, Detroit's commitment to making Detroit a welcoming city to immigrants from around the world remains just as strong and all of Detroit's welcoming city initiatives will continue."

5. Detroit’s Big Three automakers are quietly weighing how their business models might be affected Trump’s proposal for a 20 percent tariff on goods imported from Mexico to pay for the border wall, which is estimated to cost $15 billion. Trump proposed the tariff after Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto said his country will not pay for the wall, and canceled a scheduled meeting between the two leaders next week.

The Detroit News contacted all three — Dearborn-based Ford Motor Co., Detroit-based General Motors and Auburn Hills-based Fiat Chrysler Automobiles — but all declined comment.

In an earnings call Thursday, Ford Chief Financial Officer Robert Shanks told reporters that his company would feel less pain from the tariff than other automakers. According to a transcript of the call, Shanks said:

“So, it could have an adverse impact in terms of them if what we see now as a proposal passes through. And for us it looks pretty attractive actually, not having too much impact at all over the next several years in terms of our cash taxes.”

“So, it could have an adverse impact in terms of them if what we see now as a proposal passes through,” Shanks said. “And for us it looks pretty attractive actually, not having too much impact at all over the next several years in terms of our cash taxes.”

Photo by Gage Skidmore via Flickr Commons