LIBERAL, Kansas — The story of southwest Kansas is hard to tell without including immigrants.
The towns in the region have almost doubled in size following the establishment of meatpacking plants and the massive western Kansas beef industry. That has brought population, money, infrastructure and sustained communities that otherwise might have shriveled like many rural towns.
And that influx of immigrants has also created diverse demographics in a mostly white state.
In a therapy office, Sarai Aguilera sits calmly in her chair and plays with the plump pillow on her lap.
Her office has lush green plants sprawling on the walls, with a fluffy rug on the floor and calming ambient music playing in the background. When Aguilera speaks, it's so soft it almost blends in with the ambience.
This is what she calls her safe space. She is a bilingual therapist practicing in the town of Liberal, in southwest Kansas. But, the safety of this space has been harder to maintain for most of her clients. It started following the reelection of Republican President Donald Trump and harsh rhetoric about immigrants in the state without legal status.
“I truly started seeing the anxiety spike up with the people that I was directly working with,” Aguilera said. “That’s all we would talk about.”
For towns like Liberal and Dodge City, almost 20% of the people are here without legal status according to the U.S. Census. It’s common to know someone who lives in a mixed status household.
Aguilera said her clients and peers are worried about their friends or parents who may not have permission to be in the United States. Clients have also shared that they are worried about going out to restaurants, seeing a doctor or even going to church.
For Aguilera, that fear follows her home. She is a recipient of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which gives her protected status. But the DACA program is currently being reviewed by courts.
“It has definitely been tough for me to sit in a space where I provide the safe space,” she said, “while at the same time I go home and I face the same fears.”
Aguilera said it is hard to provide clients a plan to deal with anxiety when much of their future and safety are uncertain.
There has been widespread misinformation on social media about mass deportations and immigration raids. On a national level, a central promise of Trump’s 2024 campaign was to “carry out the largest domestic deportation operation in American history.”
At a state level, Kansas Republican state Sen. Mike Thompson introduced a bill that would deny state funding from law enforcement agencies who don’t assist deportation efforts. Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach has also announced Kansas Bureau of Investigation agents will be helping ICE agents “remove criminal illegal aliens from Kansas.”
While major cities in the Midwest have pockets of Latinos, this part of rural Kansas has towns where Latinos make up the majority of the population. There are also significant Somali and Afghan communities.
These communities are already feeling the impacts of fear and anxiety.
In response, just off of Main Street in Garden City, Kansas, crowds of people carrying posters rallied in opposition against the deportation of immigrants here without legal status.
Isidro Marino helped organize the rally in Garden City. He said that rhetoric about immigrants makes him feel alienated in his own community.
“My other fear is that there won't be any comprehensive immigration reform to give legal status to families who have been here for years,” Marino said.
Liberal, Garden City and Dodge city, plus surrounding communities, have the highest percentage of immigrants here without legal status than other places in Kansas.
This corner of the state relies on immigrant labor. According to research from the New American Economy, all immigrants, regardless of status in southwest Kansas, paid over $192 million in taxes and held more than $595 million in spending power during the last Trump administration.
Alejandro Rangel-Lopez is a native of Dodge City, another nearby town that is predominantly Latino. His parents are immigrants who worked at the beef packing plants for most of his life.
These immigrant families are one of the main reasons some rural towns have actually seen population growth instead of the steady declines in the surrounding areas.
“These towns in western Kansas, Garden City, Dodge and Liberal, are still alive today because of the beef packing plants and the immigrants who came here to work there,” Rangel-Lopez said.
And some locals fear that with deportations looming, it could hurt that vital industry this rural region relies on.
Rangel-Lopez leads the organization New Frontiers, which specializes in voting and immigration rights. The organization has made efforts to curb some of that lingering anxiety in these communities. Last month, New Frontiers launched an ICE watch hotline to confirm ICE sightings and cut down on misinformation spreading.
Rangel-Lopez saw his mother deported when he was young during the Obama administration. He said they understand on a deep level the concerns.
They have also handed out red cards that explain immigrants rights in English and Spanish. In the coming months they will hold “know your rights” meetings in the three towns.
But even the future of the organizations who try to help immigrants are also uncertain.
Southwest Kansas Catholic Charities, which helps immigrants find employment and housing or get legal documents, has had funding disrupted after sweeping federal funding freezes Trump signed.
Debbie Snapp is the executive director of Southwest Kansas Catholic Charities. She said even the staff themselves are unsure how a lack of funding will affect them.
“It causes a lot of anxiety with our clients that come to the door because we're not able to provide the same level of services,” Snapp said. “And it certainly provides anxiety with my staff.”
Finney County, where Garden City resides, has what’s called a 287(g) agreement with ICE. That allows designated local officers to perform certain functions of federal immigration agents, essentially enabling them to check immigration status and detain individuals.
Dodge City and Liberal do not have these agreements, however the city of Dodge City said it remains committed to upholding the laws of the United States, the State of Kansas and local laws, which includes upholding effective executive orders of the president.
But Rangel-Lopez said that this opposition has made it easier getting people to volunteer with the group.
“In the past it was like pulling teeth to get people mobilized sometimes, but now people are contacting us, wanting to get involved,” Rangel-Lopez said. “In that regard, it’s a good problem to have.”
Calen Moore covers western Kansas for High Plains Public Radio and the Kansas News Service. You can email him at cmoore@hppr.org.
The Kansas News Service is a collaboration of KCUR, Kansas Public Radio, KMUW and High Plains Public Radio focused on health, the social determinants of health and their connection to public policy.
