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United States
OpinionComment
Robert Delaney
Robert Delaney

On Balance | Baltimore bridge collapse shows how the US needs yet neglects immigrants

  • The Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse highlights the dangers and abysmal conditions faced by working class Latino immigrants in the US
  • Ideologues scapegoat migrant workers from Mexico and Central America despite benefiting from their labour

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The collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge lies on top of the container ship Dali in Baltimore, Maryland on March 29 as clean-up work begins. Photo: AFP
Robert Delaney
The US port city of Baltimore has been in America’s top headlines for nearly a week. Expect it to stay there for a while, as the Francis Scott Key Bridge wreckage becomes a political vortex into which ideologues will pour their vitriol about America’s immigration and infrastructure woes.
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Given the striking footage of such a massive structure collapsing into a heap of twisted metal and the miraculous effort to block drivers – on just a few minutes’ notice – who would otherwise have been on the bridge as it fell, the sustained interest is no surprise.

Unfortunately, that miracle didn’t extend to eight workers on the bridge, who were focused on the operation of heavy equipment needed to keep a major artery in the port city in working order. Two were rescued, but the other six lost their lives.

While full details about the workers who perished in the Baltimore bridge collapse have not been released publicly at the time of writing, we know they came to the US from Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador.

In any other context, this list of countries would have much of America sneering, particularly since the US Republican Party was hijacked by former president Donald Trump. To his “MAGA” movement, this list of countries is as triggering as terms like “gender fluidity”, “fully electric”, “science” and “TikTok”.
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About 130,000 immigrants work in the construction industry in the regions in and around Baltimore and the neighbouring national capital. They make up 39 per cent of that workforce, The Washington Post reported, citing Casa, a Maryland-based Latino and immigration advocacy organisation.

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