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| Photo: popularresistance.org |
According to ICE officials, immigration advocates have
circulated “false, dangerous and
irresponsible” reports about last week’s nationally coordinated raids, which
the officials now say netted some 680 arrests. “These reports create mass panic
and put communities and law enforcement personnel in unnecessary danger,’ ICE
charges, claiming the massive operation was simply business as usual, no
different from raids carried out under the Obama administration. The
Trump-linked rightwing newsite Breitbart.com
echoed this line and dismissed reports to the contrary as “fake news.”
It’s true
that the new “surge” carries on procedures the early Obama administration
followed, but there are significant differences—basically, that the Trump
administration has broadened the categories of people who could be targeted
and, more importantly, that an escalation of these actions is in fact precisely
what the president promised as a candidate and continues to promise now. Below
we link to two articles analyzing these differences.
Some people on the left have also stressed Obama’s record
as “deporter in chief.” Why didn’t Obama’s raids attract the same level
reporting from the media and of protests from progressives? The criticism is
justified—there certainly should have been more coverage of Obama-era raids and
more resistance to them—but that’s hardly a reason not to report on and protest
Trump’s actions now. –TPOI editor.
Trump just getting
started with immigration raids
The president granted himself sweeping authority to step
up deportations, and he's poised to use it.
By Seung Min Kim and
Ted Hesson, Politico
February 14, 2017
The arrests of hundreds
of immigrants last week marked the first large-scale raid under the Trump
administration — and the crackdown was, by all indications, just the start of
much more to come.
The expansive executive
order signed last month by President Donald Trump allows a significantly
broader population of immigrants to be picked up for deportation. And Trump has
signaled he has every intention of using that authority to carry out his
campaign pledge to deport millions of foreigners from the United States.
Immigration advocates say
the stepped-up enforcement amounts to a new deportation dragnet that’s
ensnaring otherwise law-abiding immigrants.[...]
Read the full article:
The first immigration
raids of the Trump era, explained
Both fairly standard and newly terrifying.
By Dara Lind, Vox
February 14, 2017
In North Carolina, a
husband left his house to start a car, only to be handcuffed by an Immigration
and Customs Enforcement agent. In Los Angeles, a man was arrested at the
Walmart where he worked. In Garden City, Kansas, whole apartments of people
were fingerprinted and taken into custody.
They’re three of the more
than 680 people that ICE agents around the country — from the Midwest to the
Southeast, California to New York — have arrested in the past week. Department
of Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, in a statement Monday, calls it “a
series of targeted enforcement operations,” and maintains it’s no different
from what ICE has done “for many years.” Critics call it a series of nationwide
raids — and claim it’s the first step toward President Donald Trump fulfilling
his promise to deport millions of unauthorized immigrants.
The reality is somewhere
in the middle. Nothing that ICE did last week was unprecedented. But it feels
different with President Trump in the White House — and that’s something that
ICE agents and immigrants alike know all too well.[...]
Read the full article:
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