{"id":33450,"date":"2025-07-10T05:49:54","date_gmt":"2025-07-10T05:49:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/?p=33450"},"modified":"2025-07-10T05:49:54","modified_gmt":"2025-07-10T05:49:54","slug":"ice-dragnet-strikes-terror-in-us-immigrant-communities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/?p=33450","title":{"rendered":"ICE dragnet strikes terror in US immigrant communities"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Ahisary moved from her home in Mexico in 1993 to South Central Los Angeles, where she worked multiple jobs and raised three children. In all her years in LA as an undocumented migrant, she has never experienced anything like the fear of the past few weeks.<\/p>\n

Masked officers from the country\u2019s Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE) have descended on the city, rounding up undocumented migrants like her in parks, workplaces, retail store parking lots and courthouses. <\/p>\n

\u201cPeople are afraid that it\u2019s not safe to go out,\u201d Ahisary, who asked that her name be changed for her safety, said through an interpreter. \u201cIt\u2019s unfortunate because people have to go to work. If they don\u2019t go to work, how are they going to pay their bills?\u201d<\/p>\n

When outlining his vision for deportations of undocumented migrants during his 2024 presidential campaign, Donald Trump said he would focus on expelling those with criminal records. But this has widened to include anyone without legal status, especially in large Democrat-run cities.<\/p>\n

ICE is tasked with turning Trump\u2019s mass deportation vision into reality, and the agency\u2019s aggressive tactics are striking terror throughout the country\u2019s immigrant<\/a> communities.<\/p>\n

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In order to meet demands from the administration to rapidly increase the number of deportations, ICE officers have fanned out across the country<\/span> \u00a9 John Moore\/Getty Images<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The \u201cfear factor is [an] extremely important part of the overall mass deportation initiative\u201d, said Doris Meissner, former commissioner of the US Immigration and Naturalization Service, an ICE precursor. <\/p>\n

In order to meet demands from the administration to rapidly increase the number of deportations, ICE officers have fanned out across the country, arresting suspects outside their homes, on the street and during their commutes. <\/p>\n

The agency is now arresting four times as many non-criminals as those with criminal convictions each week, according to David Bier of the Cato Institute, a libertarian think-tank. The number of immigrants in detention with no criminal charges or convictions jumped 1,300 per cent from January to mid-June, he wrote in an analysis. <\/p>\n

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Data from the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, which tracks federal enforcement activities, shows that of the 56,397 people held by the agency by June 15, 71.7 per cent had no criminal record. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think the shift is that the administration is realising that if you continue to focus on the criminal population [they\u2019re] never going to get to those [deportation] numbers that [they\u2019re] looking for,\u201d said John Sandweg, an acting director of ICE during Barack Obama\u2019s administration. <\/p>\n

\u201cGenerally the criminal population is a little harder to find [and] it takes some more work before you can make an arrest.\u201d<\/p>\n

The agency\u2019s efforts to round up undocumented migrants have been accompanied by a turbocharged PR campaign. Homeland security<\/a> secretary Kristi Noem has posted videos of herself taking part in raids wearing an ICE vest and even brandishing an assault rifle, and regularly urges undocumented migrants to \u201cself deport\u201d. <\/p>\n

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt\u2019s media briefings are often held against a background of TV screens showing \u201carrested\u201d posters. <\/p>\n

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Homeland security secretary Kristi Noem has posted videos of herself taking part in raids wearing an ICE vest <\/span> \u00a9 X@Sec_Noem\/Reuters<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The messaging and the show of force send a clear message: leave before we come and get you.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone recognises that it would be extremely difficult to try to identify and arrest and then remove millions of people,\u201d said Jessica Vaughan, director of policy studies at the Center for Immigration Studies, an anti-immigration think-tank. \u201cIt\u2019s more efficient and it\u2019s more humane to send the message that people should go home on their own.\u201d<\/p>\n

ICE was established in 2003 as part of the new Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which was created in the aftermath of the September 11 2001 terror attacks. It encompasses two law enforcement directorates: Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI).<\/p>\n

ERO is charged with enforcing US immigration laws and has 6,100 deportation officers. HSI has about 6,500 special agents who conduct transnational criminal investigations and do not usually participate in domestic immigration operations.<\/p>\n

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The expanded arrest campaign sparked protests in LA<\/span> \u00a9 Spencer Platt\/Getty Images<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

However, with deportations becoming a top domestic priority, HSI agents \u2014 along with those from the FBI, the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives \u2014 have been put on immigration enforcement duties, but do not always agree with the shift in priorities.<\/p>\n

\u201cHSI special agents, we wanted no part of\u201d immigration enforcement, said John Tobon, a former HSI assistant director. Many \u201cstill want no part of it\u201d, he added. <\/p>\n

In LA, Trump sent in Marines and National Guard to support the migrant roundups \u2014 prompting the ire of Governor Gavin Newsom and local officials. They have also been deployed to other states. <\/p>\n

The Trump administration \u201chas taken a whole-of-government approach\u201d to mass deportations, so \u201cwe are seeing a far greater range of effort and support for ICE\u201d from other parts of the federal apparatus, said Meissner.<\/p>\n

The deportation drive has been boosted by Trump\u2019s so-called big, beautiful bill, which allocates about $170bn for immigration enforcement and border security, including $45bn to increase ICE\u2019s detention capacity and about $30bn to hire 10,000 new ICE personnel. <\/p>\n

Almost $34bn will go to immigration and border enforcement agencies \u2014 two-thirds of all federal law enforcement spending, according to Bier\u2019s analysis. The FBI, by comparison, will get $4.2bn<\/p>\n

Last month, Trump ordered ICE to step up its arrests in Democratic strongholds, including LA, Chicago and New York, claiming without evidence that Democrats in the largest cities want undocumented immigrants to vote illegally for them. <\/p>\n