News from rural America.

Immigrant communities are getting advice from advocates as the reach of ICE expands, experts in rural America urge lawmakers to ramp up protections against elder abuse, and a multi-state arts projects seeks to close the urban-rural divide.

TRANSCRIPT

[♪♪♪] For the Daily Yonder and Public News Service, this is the news from rural America.

The Trump administration is rushing to meet deportation goals, while advocates want to protect immigrants from the expanded reach of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

In the northwest corner of Washington, Daily Yonder contributor Nat Nichols found some state protections for migrants stemmed from previous ICE encounters.

The immigrant community became really, really afraid to gather publicly in a small rural town.

In 2008, Customs stopped a terrorist entering the Olympic Peninsula on the ferry.

That led ICE to station more than six times the agents to the isolated rural area.

According to the documentary, "Keep the Border Patrol on the Border," agents stopped tens of thousands of vehicles and monitored schools and hospitals.

Now, according to state law, ICE agents are permitted in school offices, but not elsewhere.

Not into any of the classrooms, not onto a school bus, not onto anything that's not deemed public space.

The number of folks 60 and older is set to double in 25 years.

And to avoid more elder abuse, experts say states need to clarify how it's defined and who should report it.

Utah's Director of Aging and Adult Services, Nels Holmgren, says in sparsely populated areas, there are fewer investigations and a reluctance to ask for them.

Here in the West generally, but specifically in rural communities, there's a real sense of rugged independence.

People are less likely to ask for help.

It's estimated one in 10 older U.S. adults experience some form of abuse each year, and only one in five incidents gets reported.

Holmgren says the elderly often neglect themselves, but physical, psychological, and financial abuse are also common.

It's disconcerting the growth in financial exploitation.

He urges lawmakers to clarify the definition of abuse and strengthen state laws.

A multi-state arts initiative is answering political divisions with urban-rural solidarity.

Anya Suppian explains.

One Minnesota installation features makeshift phone booths to connect people miles away, while a photographic magazine compares the daily lives of folks in rural Marcellus, Michigan, with those in Detroit.

Director of Springboard for the Arts, Laura Zabel, says they have nearly three dozen artists working to build mutual understanding.

We knew that going into a presidential election year, there was gonna be a lot of narrative around urban-rural divide, and we wanted to kind of counter that narrative and build solidarity across urban and rural places.

She says Springboard has supported projects across four states.

What came out of it is just a really beautiful demonstration of all of the different ways that we're connected and all of the different creative ways that we might reach out to one another.

I'm Anya Suppian.

For the Daily Yonder and Public News Service, I'm Roz Brown.

For more rural stories, visit dailyyonder.com.