Warren, Markey Lead Delegation in Pressing For Investigation Into ICE’s Excessive Use of Force, Aggressive Arrest Tactics

Immigration agents have escalated arrest tactics, including hiding identities, targeting schools and churches, arresting bystanders
“ICE’s escalating aggression is not making us safer.”
“In light of these reports of ICE’s potential violations of agency policy and constitutional rights, we ask that [Homeland Security watchdogs] review these matters.”
Text of Letter (PDF)
Washington, D.C. —U.S. Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Ed Markey (D-Mass.) led Massachusetts’ Congressional delegation in pressing Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials on Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) increasingly aggressive and intimidating tactics used during enforcement actions. The lawmakers requested an immediate investigation by DHS’s Office of Inspector General and Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties (CRCL) and necessary corrective action.
“ICE’s conduct has gone beyond simply enforcing the law against people convicted of violent crimes and has subjected community members who pose no threat, including parents and children, to seemingly needless harm,”wrote the lawmakers.
Over the past month, ICEarrested nearly1,500 Massachusetts residents during a series of large-scale immigration raids. During these raids, ICE agents have usedincreasingly aggressive tactics, including psychological and physical coercion, hiding agents’ identities and refusing to provide identification, targeting sensitive locations like schools and churches, and arresting people who are not the targets of raids, including U.S. citizens.
Officers recently used a sledgehammer tobreak the windowof a parked car in New Bedford, Massachusetts, raining shards of glass on a couple waiting for their attorney. Similarly, in Chelsea, Massachusetts, ICE agents stopped a family leaving church, reportedlyheld a gun up to the car, then broke the car window and threw the father to the ground to handcuff him. In Worcester, Massachusetts, local law enforcement reportedly forced a teenager to the ground andheld her face to the pavementduring an ICE arrest.
The agency’s tactics have also caused psychological terror. Agents have covered their faces with masks, worn plain clothes, and driven unmarked vehicles — including in the case of the Tufts University student, Rumeysa Ozturk, whose arrestat first appearedto be a kidnapping. Agents have intentionally conveyed false identities, such as a recent case in whichagents reportedly posedas utility workers.
“This obfuscation not only stokes fear but makes it more difficult for community members to distinguish real agents from impersonators, and kidnappings by civilians posing as ICE officers are on the rise,”wrote the lawmakers.
As ICE attempts to ramp up arrest numbers to an unprecedented 3,000 per day, agents have encountered the wrong person and nevertheless proceeded with the arrest. ICE agentsrecently arrestedan 18-year-old high school student, Marcelo Gomes Da Silva, who has been a resident of Milford, Massachusetts since age six. Though ICE intended to arrest his father, agents proceeded to detain the teenager, who had no pending criminal charges — horrifying his town and communities around the country.
Almosthalf of the individualsrecently arrested by ICE in Massachusetts have no criminal record whatsoever, according to ICE’s own data.
“These seemingly indiscriminate arrests sweep in long-time community members, including young people who have spent almost their entire lives in the United States,”wrote the lawmakers.“Some law enforcement agencies are sounding the alarm that ICE’s tactics actually make their jobs harder by eroding community trust in law enforcement.”
As a result of these potential violations of agency policy and constitutional rights, the Massachusetts congressional delegation urged the Homeland Security Inspector General and head of CRCL to investigate ICE’s conduct, including its excessive force and rationale for using military gear; the agency’s plan to prevent the use of immigration enforcement as a tool for retaliation against critics, dissenters, or political opponents; and CRCL’s capacity to conduct this oversight given recent reductions to the watchdog office.
“The human toll of these tactics is immense. Families are being separated, and citizen and noncitizen community members alike are left living in fear,”wrote the lawmakers.
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