Abuse hotline sees more calls from immigrants

Official says the surge in reports began in Trump’s run for president

The nation’s most prominent domestic violence hotline reports a sharp increase in calls from abuse victims struggling with issues related to their immigration status.

NEW YORK — The nation’s most prominent domestic violence hotline reports a sharp increase in calls from abuse victims struggling with issues related to their immigration status.

The National Domestic Violence Hotline, established by Congress in 1996 and partly reliant on federal funding, says in its newly released annual report that it responded to 323,660 phone calls, texts and online contacts in 2016. Of these calls, 7,053 evoked immigration-related issues — up nearly 30 percent from 2015.

Katie Ray-Jones, the hotline’s CEO, said many of the callers were not U.S. citizens and were warned by their abusers that they and their families would be deported if the abuse was reported to the police. In some cases, she said, the abusers had threatened to call federal immigration authorities.

Ray-Jones said the surge in immigration-related calls became noticeable in mid-2016 at a time when Donald Trump was clinching the Republican presidential nomination and the GOP platform was echoing his calls for tough enforcement of immigration laws.

One worrisome development, Ray-Jones said, is that relatives, friends and neighbors of immigrant abuse victims who might have reported abuse in the past are now wary of doing so for fear they might be targeted for deportation.

In the current environment, hotline staffers find it challenging to respond to some of the calls, RayJones said.

“We’re not in a place where we can say, ‘Oh, don’t worry. That’s not going to happen,’ ” she said.

She said hotline staffers still encourage victims to seek refuge at domestic violence shelters, even though some victims fear such facilities might be targeted by immigration authorities. “We’ve yet to hear of a story of a shelter being raided,” Ray-Jones said.

Release of the hotline data comes amid widening debate over how federal immigration policies are affecting domestic violence.

Many activists engaged in immigration and domestic violence issues were outraged when a transgender woman was arrested on an immigration charge in February by federal agents in an El Paso courthouse as she obtained a protective order against an abusive boyfriend.

Since then, officials in several cities, including Denver Mayor Michael Hancock and Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck, have expressed concern that some domestic violence victims might not report the abuse or come to court out of fear of arrest and deportation.

In April, the Homeland Security Department said it can’t promise that immigrants in the U.S. illegally won’t be arrested if they come forward to report they have been a victim of a crime or a witness to one. However, department spokesman David Lapan said there are special visas for immigrants in the country illegally who are victims of certain crimes, including domestic violence.