By shedding light on how Mexicans are racialized, scholars have brought racism to the forefront of migration research. Still, less is known about how “illegality” complicates racialized experiences, and even less is known about how gender and class further complicate this process. Drawing on 60 interviews with Mexican-origin women in Houston, Texas, this research explores how documented and Mexican American women are racialized, the institutional contexts in which this process occurs, and how women’s racialized experiences relate to feelings of belonging and exclusion. Findings suggest a form of discrimination that is intersectional and imbued within an anti-immigrant climate. “Racializing illegality” unfolds within institutional contexts that include the workplace, criminal justice system, educational institutions, and health care settings. Both immigrant and Mexican American women experience feelings of belonging and exclusion but face more exclusion associated with an anti-immigrant sentiment. This article shows the gravity of “illegality” as it extends across legal status, nativity, race, and generation status. It also contributes to the race and migration literature by suggesting the need for an intersectional approach to studying “illegality.”

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A growing anti-immigrant context has increased the discrimination Latino immigrant families confront in the United States. This study examines the relationship between discrimination and Latinos’ parenting practices. Using cross-sectional data on parenting practices, discrimination, immigration-related factors, and protective factors among Latino immigrant families, we conduct a latent profile analysis to (a) identify profiles of perceived discrimination, (b) assess the role of protective mechanisms in predicting discrimination profiles, and (c) examine the relationship between discrimination profiles and parenting outcomes. The findings revealed a four-class solution, Low Discrimination, Institutional and Language Discrimination, Moderate Discrimination, and High Discrimination. Parents in the High Discrimination profile experienced lower levels of monitoring, consistent discipline, and higher levels of harsh disciplining compared with the other profiles. Overall, this article has implications for effective family functioning given that parental discrimination may influence parenting practices, which has direct consequences on parent–child relationships.

Activation among Latino parents was improved with MePrEPA, which can be readily incorporated in current practices by mental health clinics. Future work should replicate findings in a large number of sites, adding behavioral measures and distal impacts while examining MePrEPA's effects across settings and populations.

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