Newsfeed > NCP Statement in Support of Immigrant Communities
NCP Statement in Support of Immigrant Communities
The New Center for Psychoanalysis firmly stands with immigrant communities
throughout Los Angeles and California, who are currently facing escalating threats and
profound uncertainty as ICE and other agencies intensify enforcement operations.
Events that force people to migrate are traumatic, as migration itself is born from
rupture. When arriving in a new land, immigrants and asylum seekers turn to the host
country, symbolically a parent, for protection, yet often feel unwanted. Their motherland
has failed them, sometimes becoming persecutory, while the new country greets them
with suspicion or hostility. This asymmetry leaves migrants powerless and thus deepens
their psychological wounds as the government decides if, when, and under what
conditions they may stay.
Targeting vulnerable individuals, often in violation of constitutional protections, is an
affront to justice and human dignity. Such tactics do not enhance safety; they perpetuate
systems of domination and inflict lasting psychological harm, retraumatizing families and
individuals. As mental health clinicians, we witness the severe psychological toll of
forced deportation and family separation. Anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress
are widespread among children and adults. The constant threat of detention breeds
dread, fractures the sense of belonging and safety, and plants seeds of
intergenerational trauma. Our field was shaped by those who fled war and
persecution. Psychoanalysis itself has crossed many borders in order to survive, and it
remains attuned to the wounds of exile and the enduring struggle for psychic
continuity and survival in the face of displacement.
NCP will not align with shifting political agendas. We reject all practices and policies that
reduce individuals to their country of origin, ethnicity, race, or skin color. Instead, we
affirm every person's inherent dignity and complexity, beyond reductive and imposed
classifications. We stand with our patients, students, colleagues, neighbors, and loved
ones who are being criminalized and dehumanized, and we remain committed to
offering emotional support and raising our voice for the most vulnerable.
NCP Board of Directors