The Trump administration is restricting the same legal immigration programs that have led to some of the most successful entrepreneurs and companies in the U.S. Alfred Chuang, general partner at Race Capital and co-founder and former CEO of BEA Systems, gained citizenship after earning his master's in computer science at the University of California, Davis, and beginning a career in Silicon Valley. He notes in an op-ed for CNN that many founders and executives, including Zoom CEO Eric Yuan and Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, have followed a similar path. “Unfortunately, many others won't be as lucky,” he writes.

Take Ketaki Desai, an Indian entrepreneur and business leader formerly based in Pittsburgh. After 18 successful years and countless attempts at permanent residency, Desai and her husband left the U.S. for Canada, where they finally feel welcome. “Our case is not unique; we are friends with several other couples who are also in the process of moving to Canada … It’s so disappointing to see talented people who want to contribute to the fabric of society being pushed away,” Desai told Juliette Rihl of Public Source.

Good morning and welcome to Tuesday’s edition of Noorani’s Notes. Have a story you’d like us to include? Email your guest host at [email protected].

LESS SAFE — A former Department of Homeland Security chief of staff under the Trump administration says the country is less safe now than it was before President Trump’s election, citing the president’s obsession with, among other things, a border wall and people crossing the border without authorization. Among the dangerous distractions from legitimate security threats, Miles Taylor writes in the Washington Post: “a DHS phone briefing to discuss the color of the wall.” The president also wanted to double down on family separation: “Incredibly, after this ill-conceived operation was rightly halted, in the following months the president repeatedly exhorted DHS officials to restart it and to implement a more deliberate policy of pulling migrant families apart en masse, so that adults would be deterred from coming to the border for fear of losing their children.” Let that sink in.

ENTREPRENEURIAL SPIRIT — Even as President Trump’s immigration policies are turning immigrants off of the U.S., a new generation of educated, entrepreneurial East Asian immigrants are helping to revitalize one of the country’s largest cities, Chicago, by settling and starting successful businesses in the city’s overlooked neighborhoods. “Between 2010 and 2018, the Chinese American population increased 20% in the metro area and 32% in the city,” reports Ed Zotti at the Chicago Sun Times, making Chicago the only major U.S. city with a growing Chinatown.

INEQUITY — Younger Latinos are more likely to die from the coronavirus than their white peers, according to a new analysis from the Wall Street Journal. “Just 3% of white people who die are under 55, but 8% of Asians, 11% of Black people, 18% of Latinos and 24% of American Indians are under that age,” write Paul Overberg and Jon Kamp. Higher representation in frontline jobs and poor access to health care may be among the contributing factors.

PAINFUL HISTORY — Amid the nation’s focus on Black lives, Latino activists are raising visibility of their own painful history of deadly encounters with police. “Activists say cases from Phoenix to Springfield, Massachusetts, point to patterns of violent interactions by police against Latinos similar to those of Black people,” Russell Contreras writes for the Associated Press. But “Latino cases seldom garner national attention, even when caught on video.”

‘LARGER NARRATIVE’ — In another report of retaliation against an immigrant detainee, the lawyer for Ernest Francois says Francois has faced recurring harassment from guards at the Essex County Correctional Facility, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center in Newark, N.J., since exposing poor conditions and negligent medical care at the facility last year. “As recently as June 30th, a sergeant allegedly locked Francois in his cell and said: ‘You’re never going home,’ and ‘white power,’” reports Matt Katz for Gothamist.

ACCOUNTING FOR THE PAST — Molly O’Toole and Melissa Gomez at the Los Angeles Times dive into the contrasting immigration policies of President Trump and presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden. “Trump’s policy on immigration is, in effect, a negation,” they write. “Abandoning any pretext of targeting only illegal action or working with Congress — including when Republicans controlled both chambers — through more than 400 executive actions, according to the Migration Policy Institute, his administration has essentially sealed off the U.S. southern border, slashed legal immigration and reduced foreign policy toward Latin America to enforcement.” But these policies build on precedents set by previous administrations, including former President Obama’s, leaving Joe Biden needing to account for his own legacy: “Obama deported more immigrants than any other president … his administration conducted widespread family raids, prioritizing Central American parents and children for removal.”

Thanks for reading,

Dan