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On Tuesday, the Associate Press announced that the term “illegal immigrants” will no longer be used by its thousands of reports. In an interview with TIME – which also discourages the use of this term – , the AP standards editor, Tom Kent, noted, “we try to be fair to people’s feelings, but we’re not responding to one political current or another.”
This announcement seems to have created a buzz as reporters search for an alternative. The term “undocumented immigrant” is most commonly used; however, Kent argues that this term is too broad and imprecise, “after all, an ‘undocumented’ immigrant could have all sorts of documents, like a driver’s license or a birth certificate from their home country.”
When presented with another alternative, “out-of-status,” Kent argues that this term is a no-go as well – “everybody has some status.” This leaves fewer alternatives. However, for immigration activists who are anti-i-word, the fact that the AP has set this new requirement to avoid the term “illegal” still remains an event to celebrate. Share your thoughts about this action by writing to us!
Immigration Attorneys, LLP focuses its practice in the area of immigration and nationality law. We represent clients in a wide variety of immigration case matters including family and employment-based work, deportation defense work, immigrant and non-immigrant visa work, consular processing overseas and naturalization matters.