A new immigrants’ rights campaign calls on New York to end all collaboration with Immigration and Customs Enforcement

One would think that New York, the quintessential immigrant city, would be the last place where a campaign such as ICE-Free NYC would be needed. But you would be wrong.

The campaign, spearheaded by the Migrant Power Alliance (MPA) and human rights organizations such as Families for Freedom, Black Alliance for Just Immigration, and Raza Youth Collective, is calling on City Hall to end all collaboration with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). It was launched last week in front of the ICE offices at 26 Federal Plaza.

“ICE detainers initiate a chain of traumatic events,” said Abraham Paulos, executive director of Families for Freedom. “New York City, with an iconic immigrant history, is choosing to comply with current policy, but our campaign presents the opportunity to reverse course from that shameful legacy.”

Detainers are immigration requests that ask local law enforcement to hold non-citizens for 48 hours past their scheduled release so they can be considered for deportation.

A growing number of cities and counties are taking measures to shield immigrants from unjustified deportations and strengthen public safety by reestablishing their battered trust in the police — one of the consequences of local authorities doing immigration work.

Miami, San Francisco, New Orleans and Washington, D.C. are some of the cities that have reviewed their cooperation with the dreaded ICE. Thirteen counties in Oregon did the same last month, after a federal judge in central Oregon decided that an immigrant woman’s constitutional rights were violated when she was held in jail without probable cause at the request of U.S. immigration authorities.

Last March the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit ruled that states and localities are not required to imprison people based on detainer requests from ICE. The requests, the court said, are not mandatory. The ruling further makes clear that states and localities may share liability when they participate in wrongful immigration detentions.

Last month, Baltimore and Philadelphia also decided to review their collaboration with ICE, alleging that it weakens the immigrant community’s trust in the local authorities.

The New York City Council passed legislation twice, in 2011 and 2013, to limit cooperation with ICE, but their effectiveness was limited: Between October 2012 and September 2013, the Department of Correction granted 73% of all requests submitted by ICE and transferred over 3,000 people to federal immigration authorities. As Paulos said, it is a shameful legacy.

What the ICE-Free NYC campaign is looking for is for the city to refuse to allow ICE into city jails to look for people to deport. Also, they say, it should stop holding people once they have finished serving time for their conviction and have paid their debt to society — with no exceptions.

When asked about Mayor de Blasio’s position, his press office sent us this email:

“To be clear, city agencies, including the NYPD, do not perform immigration duties or inquire about immigration status. The city has in place Executive Orders 34 and 41 that protect the confidentiality of immigration status. With that said, the city is concerned with the appropriate implementation of Secure Communities — which facilitates the sharing of immigration data of individuals arrested by local law enforcement with ICE. The city has taken action to limit the impact of S-Comm in our immigrant communities through new detainer discretion laws that limit who is turned over to ICE when they are arrested for non-serious crimes. Mayor de Blasio is committed to enforcing those laws and ensuring that people are not put on the path to deportation for minor violations.”

In a few words, nothing new.

albor.ruiz@aol.com