ABSTRACT
This chapter traces the evolution of a group called Las Mujeres con Grilletes Electrónicos (Women with Electronic Shackles), icon of one of the largest immigration raids in US history. We uncover a compelling paradox—Las Mujeres' captivity empowered them by increasing their political, social, and economic agency, through their role as mothers, to take on the state. They pursued legal remedies available to them; they challenged their migratory status even as they were forced to endure arrest monitored by a global positioning system (GPS). In this chapter, we build on Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo's concept of transnational motherhood as we examine how their role in this regard changed for Las Mujeres in a transnational regulatory setting. We specifically examine gender roles in these women's sending communities and how those roles changed in Postville as a direct consequence of the raid. We argue that although the state shapes transnational gender roles in important ways, the experience of Las Mujeres demonstrates how active agents, in this case in the role of transnational mothers, empowered themselves via their agency to use the state's “structure” to challenge and change their immigration status as they responded to their dehumanizing treatment and criminalization.
