The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Immigration arrests spark sharp response
Georgia immigrants are “living in fear” because of last week’s enforcement actions, according to one advocate.
Federal immigration authorities arrested hundreds of unauthorized immigrants across the country last week — including about 30 in metro Atlanta — as part what they are calling “targeted enforcement operations.”
In the government’s Atlanta region of operations — which includes Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina — 192 people were apprehended last week, according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Nearly 100 of them were arrested in Georgia alone.
ICE officials said a majority of them have criminal convictions. But officials could not immediately identify them or provide additional details about their cases, and they said it’s possible some are not criminals. They also called their figures “preliminary,” stressing they were still tallying the figures.
ICE also confirmed similar operations were carried out in Chicago, Los Angeles and New York City last week.
The arrests follow President Donald Trump’s contested crackdown on illegal immigration. They also come as an immigrant mother in Phoenix — granted leniency during the Obama administration — was deported to Mexico on Thursday. Her case has become a rallying cry for immigrant groups who believe Trump’s approach to immigration will unfairly tear apart families.
The arrests sparked a strong response from those on both sides of the immigration debate.
Azadeh Shahshahani, legal and advocacy director for the group Project South, said Georgia immigrants are “living in fear” because of last week’s enforcement actions.
“I think it’s deplorable that the government is targeting people who have been living in this community for years,” Shahshahani said. “There needs to be a stop to this.”
David Hancock, co-chairman of the United Tea Party of Georgia, wondered if such sentiments are part of the “anti-Trump hysteria that is sweeping the nation.”
“Perhaps this is actually ICE operating the way it always has, but now everything the federal government does is under a microscope,” he said.
ICE officials said last week’s enforcement actions were routine and were planned before Trump signed his decrees.
“Every day, as part of routine targeted enforcement operations, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement fugitive operations teams arrest criminal aliens and other individuals who are in violation of our nation’s immigration laws,” ICE spokesman Bryan Cox said in a prepared statement. “ICE conducts targeted immigration enforcement in compliance with federal law and agency policy.”
ICE officials also denied they were carrying out “sweeps or raids that target aliens indiscriminately.”
“What I would really like to do is to appeal to everyone to continue to be prudent in your coverage of immigration enforcement,” David Marin, ICE’s Los Angeles field office director, told reporters in a conference call Friday evening.
“The rash of these recent reports about ICE checkpoints and random sweeps and the like — it is all false. And it is definitely dangerous and irresponsible because reports like that create a panic and they put communities and the law enforcement personnel in unnecessary danger.”
Shahshahani is not ready to give the agency or the Trump administration the benefit of the doubt.
“We’re in touch with immigrants around the state who are obviously concerned, afraid of what could be happening,” she said. “Unfortunately, I think that might be an actual motive of the administration.”
Hancock wants to make Georgia less friendly to unauthorized immigrants so they will move elsewhere. For example, he’d like to make English the state’s official language and impose stiff fines on employers who hire unauthorized immigrants.
“Self-deportation is the best option,” he said. “But I suppose that if ICE started conducting raids, that would contribute to an unfriendly environment for illegals.”