4 months in, activists say Trump’s operation in DC increasingly targets immigrants
WASHINGTON (AP) — When President Donald Trump takes office law enforcement operation inside Washington, D.C.four months ago he declared it his duty to combat rampant crime.
But activists and local leaders say the statement belies what is emerging as a simultaneous crackdown on immigrants who are increasingly worried about their status and safety in the city.
One third of those arrested during the operation immigration relatedThat’s according to official figures reviewed by The Associated Press. Activists and immigrants say arrests are frequent and frightening. A lawsuit claims they are generally illegal. and with no end in sight Despite the increase in the number of law enforcement officers in the city, there is no sign that arrests of immigrants will end.
Activists and local leaders say the threat to immigrants in the city has become routine.
Immigration enforcement sweeps “are no longer on the nightly news because it’s business as usual,” said Washington council member Brianne K. Nadeau.
Trump says D.C. operation is a crime-fighting mission
Trump launched the federal response in D.C. in mid-August with an emergency order that took over the city’s police department and sent in hundreds of National Guard troops as well as federal agents.
Trump’s Republican administration says the D.C. mission is meant to fight crime and touts it as a major success, but crime was already on the decline before the operation began.
Official figures show that nearly 33% of the more than 7,500 arrests made since the start of the operation until Monday were immigration-related. In September, Associated Press analysis It turned out that 40 percent of the 2,400 arrests were immigration-related.
According to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement figures released by the University of California, Berkeley, Deportation Data Project, of the approximately 1,130 immigration arrests made in the Democratic-dominated city from the start of the operation through Oct. 15, the date the data was available, 947 had no criminal record or outstanding criminal record.
“The focus of President Trump’s highly successful D.C. operation has been to address crimes committed by everyone, regardless of immigration status,” said White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson, adding that most of those arrested had committed crimes, had outstanding warrants or had previous convictions.
Statistics showed that arrests during that period were wide-ranging, including murder and drug charges.
‘My neighbors are being harassed, attacked and kidnapped’
Although the emergency order affecting police expired in September, arrest sweeps, checkpoints, masked law enforcement officers and unmarked vehicles can still be seen.
Dozens of witnesses expressed ongoing concerns during a more than 10-hour town hall hearing earlier this month. Residents of the area said they were subjected to detentions by law enforcement officers, often masked and unidentified. Common targets were school drop-off areas, food distribution areas, landscaping, and apartment buildings with a large Hispanic population. There were numerous complaints that the local Metropolitan Police Department continued to work closely with ICE on immigration efforts, despite a promise from Mayor Muriel Bowser, a Democrat, not to do so.
Nadia Salazar Sandi, a Bolivian immigrant, told the meeting that numerous family members had been detained in recent months, leaving empty seats at the Thanksgiving dinner.
“It’s terrible,” he said of immigration operations. “I am now a citizen and I walk with my passport.”
Eyewitnesses said some of the arrests began with routine traffic stops by the Metropolitan Police. One example started as an expired tag stop that attracted more than a dozen federal officers and agents.
“My neighbors are harassed, attacked and kidnapped every day,” said city resident Leah Tribbett. “I could probably talk through this entire hearing and still not describe every single example of the brutality I saw.”
An earlier information session that Nadeau held revealed the increasing desire of some immigrants to disappear from the public eye. One witness was a medical professional who described a family considering foregoing speech and occupational therapy for their autistic child out of fear authorities would wait for them at the clinic.
Tactics used during arrests challenged in court
Earlier this month, a federal judge blocked the Trump administration from carrying out large-scale immigration arrests in the nation’s capital without a warrant or probable cause that the people arrested had violated immigration law or were known to be a flight risk.
Lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union and other plaintiffs argued that federal officers frequently patrolled and set up checkpoints in neighborhoods with large numbers of Hispanic immigrants and then stopped and arrested people indiscriminately.
José Escobar Molina, one of the plaintiffs in the case, said in court documents that he has temporary legal protection and has lived in the city for 25 years. He said that while he was walking from his apartment to his work truck, two cars pulled up next to him. He said unidentified federal agents captured and handcuffed him without asking his name, identification or any information about his immigration status. He also said they didn’t ask where he lived, how long he had been in the area or whether he had ties to the community.
Trump administration lawyers argued that agents had probable cause to detain Molina and the other plaintiffs in the manner used.
Department of Homeland Security Deputy Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said the arrests in Washington and beyond were carried out legally and all detainees were given due process.
Madeleine Gates, deputy attorney for the nonprofit Washington Lawyers’ Committee and one of the attorneys representing the plaintiffs, said additional testimony was submitted by community members about dozens of examples where people were arrested without proper procedures.
“What we saw in practice was police officers arresting people without knowing who they were,” Gates said.
Trump did not say when he might scale back the federal law enforcement increase. do not follow shooting of two National Guard members Trump, who allegedly brought an Afghan citizen to the city last month, said he planned to bring hundreds more soldiers to support the operation.
Local leaders are holding hearings and sounding the alarm about the arrests. But they admit there is little they can do to back down in a federal district with limited autonomy.
“The most frustrating reality is that we do not have the same tools of power and control or the same rights as a territory where each of the other 50 states has to protect their residents,” said city council member Brooke Pinto.
