Summary
Summary: This quasi-experimental study examined whether "sanctuary city" policies are an effective mechanism for reducing mental health inequalities by immigrant origin status in Latinx populations in California. Ample evidence indicates that people experience mental health problems when restrictive immigration policies are imposed. It remains unclear whether sanctuary city policies can improve population mental health in the groups targeted by restrictive immigration policies: undocumented immigrant Latinxs, documented immigrant Latinxs, and native-born Latinxs.
Authors combined data on California's 482 cities concerning whether and when they implemented a sanctuary policy with health data on approximately 142,000 adults, 6,400 adolescents and 13,000 children from the 2007–2018 California Health Interview Surveys (CHIS). After using propensity score matching to identify nonsanctuary cities comparable to sanctuary cities, researchers estimated respondent-level difference-in-differences models to determine whether sanctuary city policies had beneficial mental health effects on three age groups: adults, adolescents, and children during the period 2007–2018.
Findings: There was a trend toward improved mental health in sanctuary cities after policy enactment, but the patterns of mental health in the three Latinx immigration subgroups of each age group did not conform to authors' hypotheses. Buffering the adverse effects of harsh federal immigration policies may need to involve other approaches, such as expanded local mental health care access. Authors discuss these results in terms of alternative treatment interference, residents' policy awareness, the policy's capacity to address past health impacts, methodological issues, and potential policy momentum.
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