· YouTube · By Border Crossing Law Firm · From the Border Crossing Law Firm media archive.
Shahid Haque discusses how the North American Free Trade Agreement displaced Mexican farmers and workers while allowing goods and capital, but not people, to move freely. He argues that this imbalance pushed migration north, supplied corporations with vulnerable labor on both sides of the border, and encouraged the public to blame migrants rather than the policies and employers shaping the labor market. He calls for immigration reform that creates realistic legal pathways alongside trade reform.
The interview captures a recurring theme in Shahid's advocacy: immigration cannot be understood only as a border-enforcement question. For a Montana audience familiar with agricultural labor and workers moving toward the Bakken boom, he connected local migration patterns to national trade and wage policy.