(Last Updated On: November 25, 2025)
Discrimination against immigrants in American culture is rising rapidly, and many job applicants and employees in Massachusetts are experiencing unequal treatment to varying degrees. According to a recent survey conducted by the Pew Research Center, about one third of immigrants who are legally in the United States have reported facing “a lot” of discrimination in 2025, and about two thirds have said that they have experienced at least “some” discrimination. For many of those immigrants, co-workers and community members have made assumptions about their immigration status and have treated them differently based on those erroneous assumptions. It is critical for both employees and employers to know that there are laws in place that prohibit discrimination against immigrants in employment contexts.
Those protections include discrimination prohibitions based on citizenship status, as well as protections based on race and ethnicity, including those derived from assumptions and damaging stereotypes. Our Massachusetts employment discrimination attorneys can explain in more detail.
Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) Protections for Immigrant Employees
The Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) is an extremely important federal law that prohibits certain forms of discrimination on the basis of a person’s immigration experience or perceived immigration background. The law is crucial for protecting job applicants and employees in Massachusetts who are immigrants because it applies to more employers than does state or other federal laws. This law generally applies to employers with at least four employees, which includes most employers in the state of Massachusetts.
Specifically, the provision of the INA that provides these protections is 8 USC 1324(b), and this provision of the federal law is enforced by the Immigrant and Employee Rights Section (IER) of the Civil Rights Division of the US Department of Justice. This provision of the INA prohibits the following forms of discrimination, which impact immigrants in the context of employment:
- Citizenship status discrimination in hiring, firing, or recruitment for a fee;
- National origin discrimination in hiring, firing, or recruitment or referral for a fee;
- Unfair documentary practices during the employment eligibility verification process (e.g., Form I-9 and E-Verify);
- Retaliation or intimidation.
The law specifically clarifies that a “protected individual” includes a person who is “a citizen or national of the United States,” as well as “an alien who is lawfully admitted for permanent residence, is granted the status of an alien lawfully admitted for temporary residence, is admitted as a refugee, or is granted asylum.” In other words, an immigrant who is legally in the United States, even if they do not yet have a green card, is protected by the INA against employment discrimination on the basis of citizenship and national origin.
Prohibitions Against Discrimination on the Basis of Race, Color, National Origin, and Genetic Information
Several additional federal and state laws provide protections against employees based on assumptions about their immigrant identities or statuses, including protections on the basis of race, color, national origin, and genetic information. Those laws include the following:
- Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, federal law providing protections to job applicants and employees on the basis of race, color, national origin, and other protected characteristics;
- Genetic Information and Nondiscrimination Act of 2008 (GINA), federal law providing protections in employment law against discrimination on the basis of genetic information, which can include assumptions or stereotypes about genetic information of a particular race or national origin or nationality; and
- Chapter 151B of the Massachusetts General Laws, state law providing the same protections as federal law but providing additional protections, including for protective hairstyles, for example, and applying to more employers.
Generally speaking, federal and state laws prohibit discrimination not only on the basis of actual race, color, national origin, genetic information, and more, but also on the basis of perceived race, color, national origin, genetic information, and more. Federal laws generally apply to employers with 15 or more employees, while Massachusetts state law applies to employers with 6 or more employees.
Contact a Massachusetts Employment Discrimination Attorney Representing Clients in Boston and Natick
Whether you immigrated to the United States recently or you are a second-generation, third-generation, or later-generation immigrant, there are laws that prohibit discrimination based on your actual or perceived immigration status and background. If you have faced any kind of discrimination related to assumptions about your citizenship, race, or ethnicity during the hiring process or in your current employment, it is important to seek legal advice as soon as possible from an experienced Massachusetts employment discrimination attorney who represents job applicants and employees in Boston and Natick. Contact Rodman Employment Law for more information about the services we provide to clients in Massachusetts.
