B.C. photojournalist Greg Constantine says he spent months in small towns in Indiana and Missouri documenting ICE operations under Trump-era immigration policies.
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B.C. photojournalist Greg Constantine, a dual citizen, was awarded a fellowship to investigate how U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations play out beyond major cities.
Constantine spent months in small towns in Republican strongholds such as Indiana and Missouri, documenting what he says is unfolding in communities where those policies are implemented.
He described the impact as extending beyond economics, saying, “I think that, economically, it’s affecting people, but I think from my perspective, it’s really just this destruction, total destruction, of families.”
Constantine added that “That kind of violence that’s taking place may take on a different form, but it’s impacting communities just as much.”
The project’s work is published as a series of multimedia essays in Mother Jones, with images and narratives that Constantine says capture the absence left behind—such as “a family photo without a father, a car without a driver.”
He said the documentary work also highlights how apprehensions can occur through everyday encounters, describing examples including “Routine traffic stops, profiling of people after they come out of a gas station.”
Constantine also focused on what he described as the economics tied to detention, saying, “It’s much more of a mass-detention project than anything else, because of the money that is being made off of all this,” and, “And really, the raw materials of that profit are human beings.”
He concluded by adding: “You know, human men, women, fathers, mothers, grandparents, aunts, uncles, brothers, and sisters. And that’s something that I think every American should be ashamed of.”
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