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Reporter's Notebook: Simon Fitzgerald

Immigration Raid on Broadway (in Baltimore)

Posted by Simon Fitzgerald - January 24, 2007 at 5:34 pm
Agents from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested 24 people for immigration violations January 23 in Baltimore, Maryland.  On the same day in Southern Californica, some 761 immigrants were arrested on immigration violations on "one of the biggest such sweeps ever" by US law enforcement agents. Representatives from United Workers' Association, including Spanish speaking workers who were in the area of Broadway and Lombard on the morning of January 23rd said that,  at 11:30, unmarked cars rolled up to that corner in front of the 7-11 and rounded up Hispanic immigrants waiting for work there.  At 10:30 the corner was full of people waiting for offers of work for the day.

They reported that "24 people were confirmed arrested."   A press conference was organized in the early afternoon at that corner by the UWA, Casa de Maryland and other organizations announcing the arrests and condemning them as attacks on people just trying to make a living.

At least 3 television news outlets were reporting from the corner, including CBS and Channel 2.  Witnesses said the raid was carried out by "Immigration" or ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement, part of the Department of Homeland Security).  There is no word yet if this was an isolated raid or part of a coordinated, multi-city effort that purposefully coincided with the raids in Southern California.

The United Workers Association is a human rights organization that organizes low wage workers and builds leadership from their ranks with the goal of ending poverty.  The mission of the organization takes inspiration from the Poor Peoples' Campaign of 1968.  Martin Luther King was killed on a stop of this campaign as he fought side-by-side with striking sanitation workers.

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More Evidence of Waste, Fraud and Abuse by ICE

Submitted January 25, 2007 - 2:43 am by Miguel Contreras
The United States Border Patrol (USBP), is a Federal police force, the mobile uniformed law enforcement arm of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), a bureau of the Department of Homeland Security, who by the way it's "primary function" is to arrest illegal immigrants.

In the 1990's Congress mandated that the Border Patrol shift agents away from the interior and focus them on the borders.  Currently, the U.S. Border Patrol employs over 11,000 agents, and is responsible for patrolling 19,000 miles of land and sea borders.  The Border Patrol personnel are deployed primarily at the U.S.-Mexico border, where they are assigned to control drug trafficking and illegal immigration.

However, the Border Patrol has offices and agents stationed geographically nation-wide.  Seems logical that the ICE employment raids operations can be delegated to the U.S. Border Patrol, or may be they are but only to provide "prisoner transporatation services" for ICE.  For Border Patrol office locations click on:  
http://honorfirst.com/stationlist.htm

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