Raids without Reason or Reform

The National Immigration Forum is circulating ththe following:

Earlier this month, the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security, and International Law held a “Hearing on Problems with ICE Interrogation, Detention, and Removal Procedures.” The hearing featured American citizens caught in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids, detention, and deportation. Witnesses included Marie Justeen Mancha, a U.S. citizen high school student from Georgia who was home alone when armed ICE agents broke into her house one afternoon; Michael Graves who, as a U.S. citizen employee of the Swift Co. meatpacking plant in Marshalltown, Iowa, was one of hundreds of workers detained for hours while riot-gear-wearing ICE agents interrogated them on their citizenship status; Kara Hartzler, an attorney with the Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project in Arizona; and others. In his testimony, Mr. Graves painted a frightening picture of an agency that, all across the country, has been sending heavily-armed agents after people whose “crime” is working without permission: …hundreds of heavily armed ICE agents stormed six meat packing plants across America’s heartland. …regardless of my status, [ICE]’s interrogation, the handcuffs, the guns, and the agents in SWAT uniforms were all incredibly unnecessary and intimidating …I am a U.S. citizen. I was born and raised in this country – in the same state I work and have never been overseas in my life …No one in this country, regardless of their status, should be treated the way we were treated at the Marshalltown Swift plant or any of the Swift plants. Working is not a crime, and workers do not leave their constitutional rights at the plant gate. At the hearing, Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a California Democrat and chair of the subcommittee remarked that the United States had reached an era “where an overzealous government is interrogating, detaining and deporting its own citizens while treating non-citizens even worse,” according to a Cox News Service story carried in the Austin American Statesman. The specter of government agents, guns drawn, going after workers on the shop floor, or breaking into homes without a warrant, is not only terrifying, but can only breed more distrust of the government in communities across America. Yet, this sort of behavior is just one symptom of enforcement-without-reform and a deportation-only approach to immigration. There is a desperate need for broader oversight and for sensible immigration reform policies. Related items of interest:

· Testimony from the Subcommittee Hearing: http://judiciary.house.gov/oversight.aspx?ID=410

· The Forum’s ICE Enforcement Backgrounder: http://www.immigrationforum.org/documents/TheDebate/EnforcementBorderInterior/Backgrounder_2007Enforcement.pdf

· The Forum’s Statement on Subcommittee Hearing: http://immigrationforum.org/DesktopDefault.aspx?tabid=944

KJ