House Divided Over Immigration Program

By Andrea Salazar

Republicans and Democrats in a House subcommittee butted heads over the effectiveness of Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Secure Communities (S-Comm) program Wednesday amidst claims that the program promotes racial profiling.

ICE Associate Director of Enforcement and Removal Operations Gary Mead testified in front of the House Immigration Subcommittee, part of the House Judiciary Committee, assuring lawmakers that S-Comm is taking dangerous criminals off the streets.

“Secure Communities is smart, effective immigration enforcement,” Mead said. “It provides real time leads to the ICE criminal alien program, greatly reducing the likelihood that criminal aliens will be released from state and local custody back into the community.”

S-Comm — a program designed to identify criminal illegal immigrants in state and local custody — links information from local law enforcement with the FBI and ICE.  Therefore, when a person is arrested, local police send that person’s fingerprints to the FBI, which in turn shares the information with ICE to determine immigration status.

Proponents of the measure applauded the program, but said ICE’s “prosecutorial discretion” is allowing some criminals to go free because of the Obama administration’s decision to focus on deporting only illegal immigrants who have committed a crime.

“There’s no excuse for an illegal alien, who’s not supposed to be here in the first place, driving drunk on our roads and putting the lives of the people of my county in danger,” said Sheriff Sam Page of Rockingham County, N.C., in his written statement.

Instead, Julie Myers Wood, a former assistant secretary for ICE, recommended using the rapid repatriation program - a program that allows for the release of some  illegal immigrants considered non-violent, on the condition that they agree to leave the country, waive their appeal rights and agree not to return to the U.S.

Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), however, expressed concern over Secure Communities for incidents of racial profiling and sending into deportation proceedings undocumented immigrants who have not otherwise committed serious crimes.

“Everybody who I’ve talked to who has concerns about this program, doesn’t have a concern about having violent dangerous criminals removed,” Lofgren said. “There’s more commonality here than we might expect. Where we get into trouble is when it’s somebody who hasn’t committed an offense or they’re pulled over for a faulty tail light.”

Testifying in opposition to S-Comm, Arturo Venegas, a former police chief and an immigrant himself, said the program is damaging the relationship between law enforcement and the immigrant community because people are less likely to report crimes to police if there’s a chance that they could be deported.

“If you are an immigrant, and you are charged with a serious offense, or even a minor offense, you are ‘guilty until proven innocent’ and you will be referred for deportation,” Venegas said. “As an immigrant myself, and as an American citizen, I cannot support that differing standard.”

ICE plans to implement Secure Communities nationwide by 2013.

Demonstrators Demand Executive Order Protecting DC Immigrants

By Adrianna McGinley

Community members, labor organizations and immigrant rights activists held a rally Tuesday urging DC legislators to refuse the Secure Communities program and maintain DC’s status as a sanctuary city.

The National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON) praised DC for being the first city in the nation to reject the deportation program last year but asked the mayor to keep his promise of making DC “one city” and continue resisting federal pushes to implement the program.

“The mayor ran on a platform against this deportation program, and we want him now that he’s mayor to actually do something about it,” said Sarahi Uribe, National Campaign Coordinator of NDLON. “The mayor is all about one city, but how can we have one city if families are being torn apart.”

Over an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants could be affected by this program, including Matias Ramos, co-founder of the activist organization for undocumented youth, United We Dream. Ramos, a UCLA graduate, attended the rally to speak out against the danger that he says Secure Communities poses in DC.

“One thing that Secure Communities would do is that it would systematically erode the trust between police enforcement and the communities they are supposed to serve and protect, and it would use community policing as a tool to put people through this profiteering scheme,” Ramos said. “I think it’s horrendous, and I think it’s an attack on our communities.”

Former DC Metro police officer and current president of Black Law Enforcement in America Ronald Hampton agreed with Ramos, saying it is essential for police to have a relationship with the communities they serve, and Secure Communities would destroy that.

“Secure Communities will prevent police officers and police departments from creating the must needed relationships that have to take place in order for community policing to work,” Hampton said.

Participants at the rally visited the offices of DC council members and Mayor Vincent Gray to push for an executive order that would protect DC families from deportation. Uribe said she hopes DC will continue to serve as a leader in the national push for immigration reform.

Johnny Barnes, director of the American Civil Liberties Union, had this message for the demonstrators, “Just remember this, the power of the people is stronger than the people in power.”

Homeland Security Teams With ICE To Deport Criminal Aliens

By Leah Valencia, University of New Mexico- Talk Radio News Service

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Assistant Secretary John Morton announced Thursday a new initiative to expand the ICE’s Secure Communities initiative, a program that uses biometrics, such as taking digital finger-print samplings, to identify and remove illegal immigrants that have committed crimes in the U.S.

Since its inception in October 2008, ICE's Secure Communities has identified 11,000 people who were convicted with Level 1 offenses or crimes such as murder or rape, of those 1,900 offenders have been deported from the United States.

“By the end of 2011 we project having a presence in every state,” Napolitano said. “By 2013, assuming Congress continues to fund our efforts, Secure Communities plans to expand nationwide and be available to every law enforcement agency in the country.”

Morton said the Secure Communities initiative, which was enacted one year ago, has identified more than 111,000 criminal illegal immigrants in local custody during the program's first year.

Critics say the Secure Communities initiative could be abused and result in racial profiling, explaining that a law abiding immigrant could be arrested with the sole intention of having their immigration status checked, at the discretion of a local officer.

“There is no distinction between citizen or non-citizen, every single person who is booked into a jail, gets their fingerprints checked and gets their immigration history checked,” Morton said, replying to the criticism. “This is not about, has not been and won’t be about conducting basic civil-immigration enforcement for non-criminal offenders.”

Morton noted that the goal of the initiative to identify and deport serious offenders that are dangerous, but under the initiative all illegal aliens that have committed a crime will be sent back to their country of origin.

“At the end of the day, if you are here unlawfully, not only are you deportable, but you certainly shouldn’t be committing crimes. We are going to identify those people and we are going to remove them.”