Apathy and Antipathy: Media Coverage of Restrictive Immigration Legislation and the Maintenance of Symbolic Boundaries

Abstract

Although the government no longer explicitly establishes boundaries of whiteness, it continues to play a central role in shaping symbolic boundaries between immigrants and nonimmigrants through immigration lawmaking. However, the salience of these boundaries may depend on how the media disseminate them to the public. In this study, we investigate media framing of immigration lawmaking using an original data set of news coverage of six of the most widely recognized exclusionary immigration bills and laws at different levels of government. Two patterns emerged from an iterative frame analysis. First, in their coverage of frames critical of these bills and laws, outlets devoted more attention to the effects of exclusionary legislation for nonimmigrants. Second, in their coverage of frames supportive of the restrictive legislation, outlets provided more space to those who openly associated immigrants with criminality and terrorism. Regardless of outlets' seemingly neutral stance toward restrictive legislation, their disparate coverage of exclusionary lawmaking demonstrates apathy and antipathy toward immigrants, which has repercussions for the maintenance of inequality.

Antiblackness as a Logic for Anti‐Immigrant Resentment: Evidence From California

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Immigration Attitudes Before and After Tragedy in Copenhagen: The Importance of Political Affiliation and Safety Concerns

“…Because of the highly variable, inherently unpredictable nature of measuring public opinion before and after such events, few studies have done so. Most research on immigration beliefs, especially in Europe, instead highlights the role that country-level economic conditions and immigrant group size play in shaping opinions about immigration (e.g., Ceobanu and Escandell 2010;Estrada, Ebert, and Lore 2016;McLaren 2003;Quillian 1995;Semyonov, Gorodzeisky, and Glikman 2012).…”

Threatening Places or Diverse Spaces: Divergent Constructions of Florida Puerto Ricans across Twitter and Newspaper Articles

“…Third, and most centrally, we expand scholarship on how media can shape and reflect societal acceptance of migrants (Estrada, Ebert, and Lore ; Menjívar ; Santa Ana ; Sohoni and Mendez ), and extend this area of scholarship to explore new and relevant media forms. Most research has focused on newspaper constructions.…”

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