Don't Ask, Don't Tell: The Gendered Politics of Service Provision for Women with Precarious Immigration Status.

In February 2013, Toronto city council passed a motion on "Undocumented Workers in Toronto," which reaffirmed the city's commitment to providing services to all residents regardless of their immigration status. This marked the first such 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' (DADT) sanctuary policy for undocumented migrants in Canada. In this paper, I analyze the gendered politics of DADT policies, particularly for undocumented women seeking access to shelters and anti-violence against women services. The politics of service provision are complex in such cases, given that support against gender-based violence is often funded by multiple arms of the state. Drawing from qualitative interviews with thirty service providers in Toronto who work with women in cases of gender-based violence, this research analyzes both the benefits and limitations of DADT when centering the experiences of women with precarious immigration status. The findings also show how some service providers responded to the policy's limitations by adopting organizational-level practices that sought to re-imagine the city as a postnational space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]