Sheriffs in North Carolina Refuse to Cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement
Protest in Charlotte, North Carolina, February 18, 2019 against
Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids.
In just four days in February, federal immigration
officials
arrested more than 220 undocumented people in North Carolina.
They were retaliating against five newly elected sheriffs who had
announced they would cut certain ties with Immigration and
Customs Enforcement.
Mecklenburg County, which includes
Charlotte, is one of the areas in dispute. Mecklenburg County
Sheriff Garry McFadden ran and won last year on ending the
county's participation in the controversial federal 287(g)
program, which called for participation between local law
enforcement and ICE. Whenever ICE requested what are known as
"detainers," local police and sheriffs were required to hold
people for 48 hours. This was done even if they had not been
convicted, or were citizens but ICE profiled them as
undocumented, or they had paid a fine and were free to go,
etc.
 North Carolina sheriffs' offices
for years had been working
hand in hand with ICE in its efforts to intimidate and arrest
undocumented people. Under the 287(g) program in Mecklenburg
county, local law enforcement have transferred more than 15,000
people to ICE over the past 13 years in Charlotte alone. ICE's
field director for the region said the mass arrests in February
were "the direct conclusion of dangerous policies of not
cooperating" with the agency.
Last year, voters in the state's seven largest counties
elected new sheriffs, all of them African American and five of
them stating they would not honour detainer requests from ICE.
Five are the first black sheriffs to be elected in their
respective county's history. Those wins were the result of
intense organizing around the 287(g) program and a united stand
against unjust policing and brutality against immigrants and
African Americans.
After the new sheriffs were elected, ICE's retaliation
was
swift. In Asheville in February, ICE agents -- wearing
identifying uniforms, but driving a vehicle resembling that of an
employment contractor, with ladders on top -- went into a
Hendersonville community and arrested four people. When the
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department held a forum at a church
community centre in Charlotte and invited immigrants and
undocumented people to talk to police chiefs and McFadden, the
sheriff. ICE agents showed up to harass and bully people. Across the
state, hundreds were arrested, most not for any crime but simply
for not having documentation, a civil offense.
An ICE official made this threat: "Any local
jurisdiction
thinking that refusing to cooperate with ICE will result in a
decrease in local immigration enforcement is mistaken. Local
jurisdictions that choose to not cooperate with ICE are likely to
see an increase in ICE enforcement activity, as in jurisdictions
that do not cooperate with ICE the agency has no choice but to
conduct more at-large arrest operations."
In addition, with ICE's assistance, the state
legislature
intervened to assist ICE, passing a bill that would force
sheriffs to cooperate with the agency. ICE helped them to craft
it. The bill's top sponsor, state Representative Destin Hall
said, "it's no secret that we've actually worked with federal law
enforcement officers in crafting this bill." The bill, HB 370,
forces sheriff's deputies to ask people about their immigration
status regardless of the type of criminal charge they face. And
it mandates officers to report and hand people over to ICE, and
to comply with any ICE request accompanied by a detainer. The
North Carolina Sheriff's Association announced that it opposed
the bill, but it passed. The Governor has yet to sign it into
law.
The federal government, using immigration, is striving
to
bring the local and state policing agencies under federal and
even military control, as is occurring now at the border.
Programs like 287(g) are one part of that, as are ICE raids
despite opposition, and efforts by the federal government to sue
sanctuary states like New York and California. These conflicts
between the states and federal government reflect the inability
of the rulers to solve these problems or lessen their conflicts,
which contribute to conditions of civil war.
The people's resistance standing up for rights -- of
immigrants, refugees and African Americans in this case -- shows
the way forward.
This article was published in
Volume 49 Number 14 - April 20, 2019
Article Link:
Sheriffs in North Carolina Refuse to Cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement
Website: www.cpcml.ca
Email: editor@cpcml.ca
|
