Meet the white Trump official behind the launch of Black Americans for Immigration Reform

William W. Chip, who served as the senior counselor at the Department of Homeland Security Secretary during the Trump administration, is the only agent listed for Black America for Immigration Reform. In fact, the registration address he put on the group’s form appears to be his D.C. home. A tax attorney for decades, Chip is a contributor to the Center for Immigration Studies — one of the leading think tanks that advocates for restricting immigration — where he has routinely written about how more immigration could harm Black Americans.

The nonprofit he has helped launch is an attempt to further mainstream that idea, one critics of the argument say is merely an underhanded, if not misleading attempt to try and derail comprehensive reform efforts. In an interview, Chip said that he was merely organizing the group for two Black colleagues on the Center for Immigration Studies board of directors.

The new nonprofit is in the early stages, but the plan is to soon apply for 501(c)(3) status and get a website up and running. The group isn’t initially planning to lobby, Chip said, but it wants to highlight research suggesting less-educated immigrant workers harm less-educated U.S.-born counterparts. Their emphasis will be on Black workers, who they argue face increased competition for jobs. They want to use this argument to push forward restrictionist immigration policies, including requiring businesses to use E-Verify, an online government system that allows employers to check someone’s employment eligibility, as well as efforts to cut back on legal immigration.

While writing about immigration for the Center for Immigration studies for nearly two decades, Chip did not hide his views on race. During 2021, he posted a series of inflammatory posts on Twitter, now known as X, including one tweet that questioned whether Derek Chauvin, the Minneapolis officer who killed George Floyd, was racially motivated.