Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has categorized these immigrants as “fugitives” who have been given a final order of deportation and have remained in the country. But that term encompasses a variety of people who aren’t criminals, said Cindy Breunig of the immigrant rights group Voces de la Frontera.
“A
definition of a fugitive is someone who has been given a final order of
deportation and is still in the country,” Breunig said. “Many times
people are issued these final orders of deportation without knowing
it.”
Breunig said confusion caused by a change of address,
unscrupulous immigration lawyers and bureaucratic red tape could cause
someone not to receive all of their paperwork related to the
immigration process. Once that happens, ICE targets the individual and
takes him or her into custody. If the immigrant has been given a final
order of deportation, he or she is deported with no hearing or right to
a defense. If ICE picks up an individual who is in the country
illegally but hasn’t been ordered to leave the country, that person has
a right to a hearing, a defense and the ability to post bond and return
home.
Breunig said ICE has been increasingly targeting
individuals at their homes or in their workplaces instead of conducting
large-scale raids on groups of people at work sites. She said it’s
easier for ICE’s raids on individuals to be conducted under the radar
so that the community doesn’t organize a headline-generating response.
“And in five minutes, lives are changed forever,” Breunig said.
Rosa’s Story
Milwaukee
resident Rosa said her boyfriend was seized and deported by ICE at
Easter time. “The Thursday before Easter I had gone to work and my
boyfriend calls me up and tells me that I had to come home right now,
‘Immigration’s here,’” Rosa said, still upset about that morning. “I
was like, ‘What do you mean Immigration is here for you.
What
is going on?’ He was not shown any papers—nothing. They just said that
they had the order for him to be deported. They didn’t show ID. They
had a truck in front of my house and it was not labeled. Nothing. After
they had taken him, there was another car parked about a block away,
also not labeled. They came in blue jackets. Like normal people. No ID,
no nothing.”
That would be the last time Rosa saw her
boyfriend. The ICE agents left Rosa with the couple’s children and told
her they were taking her boyfriend Downtown. But Rosa called around and
couldn’t find him in the city. Voces de la Frontera helped her find him
in the Dodge County Correctional Facility, which rents out beds for
immigration detainees. Within a week, he was in Mexico City, with no
money, no ID, no personal belongings and, most importantly, without
Rosa and their children.
Rosa said she’s stunned by what
happened, especially since her boyfriend had a clean record and didn’t
cause any trouble. She’s trying to work out a way to reunite the
family, but her boyfriend is not allowed back into the United States
for another 10 years. Until then, she’s trying to adjust to the life of
a suddenly single, working mother. She said her children are already
showing the strain of the raid and the loss of their father.
“What
am I supposed to do now?” she said. Breunig said she knows of other
individuals like Rosa’s boyfriend who have disappeared suddenly through
deportation. One woman was deported, even though law enforcement is
still trying to solve her son’s murder. Another teenager was picked up
in a van by ICE, got stuck in a Kenosha-area deportation
center for 14 days until his family could prove he was a minor, and
spent 28 days in a Chicago residence while awaiting his deportation
hearing. While families are more or less powerless during this
process—many don’t visit the detention center because that could target
them for deportation as well—some families are finding assistance
through organizations such as Voces de la Frontera and churches.
Father
Alvaro Nova of the Holy Angels Cathedral in Milwaukee is active in the
new sanctuary movement, a coalition of faith communities that supports
immigrant families from being splintered by deportations. “We want to
show that this is a problem, especially for families,” Nova said. “We
know the realities of the families. We’re looking for solutions. We
need to change the rules and change the laws.”
Voces de la
Frontera is sponsoring a statewide civil rights march on May 1, which
will call for an end to immigration raids and the separation of
families through deportation. Participants will also call on
presidential candidates to create a just and humane immigration policy
within the first 100 days of the new president’s administration.
For more information, go to www.vdlf.org.
What’s your take? Write: editor@shepex.com or comment on this story online at www.expressmilwaukee.com.
ponderingsolidarity
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