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Trump’s tweets of ICE raids spark fear; derided as re-election politics

by in News

In the offices of an Inland Empire immigrant-rights organization, the phones began ringing early on Tuesday.

Word was spreading that, late Monday, President Donald Trump tweeted a threat to have immigration agents round up “millions of illegal aliens” starting next week.

“They will be removed as fast as they come in,” Trump wrote.

While the idea is supported by many people who want tougher immigration laws, activists who support immigrants believe the tweets – delivered about 24 hours before Trump officially launched his 2020 re-election campaign at a rally in Orlando, Fla. – were more about politics than immigration enforcement.

“He’s using our community for his political benefit,” said Luz Gallegos, community programs director with the Training Occupational Development Educating Communities (TODEC) Legal Center, which has offices in Perris, Coachella and Victorville.

Still, Gallegos noted that her office fielded more than 100 calls.

But not every immigrant community in the region expressed similar concerns, at least in terms of outreach from worried people seeking information. Advocates in Orange County and Long Beach said Tuesday that they did not see an uptick in calls or emails to local hotlines after Trump’s tweets.

Some advocates suggested Trump’s tweets carried a message about race, not immigration.

“Most candidates, when they’re going to do a campaign speech, they’ll play a hit song when they come out. Trump doesn’t have a song. He puts out a racist tweet,” said Salvador Sarmiento, legislative director for the Pasadena-based National Day Labor Organizing Network.

Immigrant-rights groups, including the OC Rapid Response Network and the Long Beach Community Defense Network, are preparing in case should such raids do take place. And Gallegos said the TODEC Legal Center is planning to hold more “know your rights” sessions for immigrants.

“We don’t want to create more fear,” Gallegos said. “But we also have to know how to protect ourselves.”

Earlier this month, acting ICE director Mark Morgan told reporters that his agency “will be going after individuals who have gone through due process, and who have received final orders of deportation.”

Asked to clarify the president’s tweets, ICE officials on Tuesday issued this statement:

“The border crisis doesn’t start and stop at the border, which is why ICE will continue to conduct interior enforcement without exemption for those who are in violation of federal immigration law. This includes routine targeted enforcement operations, criminals, individuals subject to removal orders, and worksite enforcement. This is about addressing the border crisis by upholding the rule of law and maintaining the integrity of the immigration system, as created by Congress.”

The White House, meanwhile, issued a statement saying there are more than one million people in the country illegally who are here in defiance of final deportation orders. They “refuse to appear in court, they often obtain fraudulent identities, collect federal welfare, and illegally work in the United States,” the statement read.

While undocumented immigrants can be eligible for life-saving services, such as emergency rescue, they generally are not eligible to collect federal welfare. Analysis by the Syracuse University-based Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse found that of 47,000 recently arrived immigrant families, six out of seven showed up for their initial court hearings. For those who had attorneys, more than 99 percent appeared at every hearing, the researchers reported.