Guatemala’s Foreign Ministry is advising Guatemalans in the U.S. that they need not open their doors to immigration agents unless the officers have a warrant signed by a judge, the Associated Press reported. The Guatemalan government also recommended that its nationals always carry phone numbers of family members, a lawyer and the nearest consulate.
“You have rights that must be respected. … Immigration agents have the obligation to respect your basic rights, as well as treat you and your family members in a dignified manner, especially when it comes to children,” the Foreign Ministry said.
The government of El Salvador issued similar advice to any of its citizens facing enforcement action in the U.S.
Federal immigration authorities arrested 121 adults and children in Georgia, North Carolina, Texas and elsewhere over the weekend as part of a nationwide crackdown targeting Central Americans who have illegally entered the U.S.
Obama administration says it is focusing on families and individuals who were caught illegally crossing the southern border after May 1, 2014, who have been ordered deported and who have no outstanding appeals.
The crackdown comes amid a surge of Central Americans families and unaccompanied children streaming across the southwest border. Many are fleeing poverty and violent gangs in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.
Johana Gutierrez said authorities showed up unannounced at her door in Norcross early Saturday morning and took away her niece, Analizeth, and her niece’s 9-year-old son. Both had fled violence in Honduras and unsuccessfully sought asylum in the U.S. Like others arrested over the weekend, they were taken to an immigration detention center southwest of San Antonio, Texas.
“It was kind of scary because it was really early in the morning, so we were all sleeping at the time,” Johana Gutierrez said through a Spanish interpreter from the Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights. Also a mother, she added: “They brought everyone downstairs, even the kids. The kids were screaming and crying because they were scared and confused. They didn’t know what was going on.”
An unknown number of other immigrant women and children who sought asylum in the U.S. were also arrested in the Atlanta region as part of the raids Saturday, said Adelina Nicholls, the alliance’s executive director. They were also taken to the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas, said Nicholls. Some had missed immigration court dates because they didn’t have attorneys, she said.
“One of the persons who called from detention on Sunday reported that more than 47 people were on the airplane that night, flying to Texas” from Atlanta, Nicholls said.
Immigration authorities apprehended 12,505 families illegally crossing the southwest border between October and November of last year, federal statistics show. That is nearly three times the number — 4,577 — arrested during the same period in 2014.
Since 2014, the government has been deporting Central Americans at a higher rate, averaging about 14 flights a week, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said in a prepared statement Monday.
“I know there are many who loudly condemn our enforcement efforts as far too harsh,” he said, “while there will be others who say these actions don’t go far enough. I also recognize the reality of the pain that deportations do in fact cause. But, we must enforce the law consistent with our priorities.”
Illegal immigration has emerged as a flashpoint in the presidential race. Leading GOP candidate Donald Trump, who has proposed expelling millions of immigrants without legal status and building a wall on the southwest border at Mexico’s expense, tweeted on Christmas Day about the upcoming raids: “Does everyone see that the Democrats and President Obama are now, because of me, starting to deport people who are here illegally. Politics!”
Advocates for immigrants decried the government’s actions Monday, noting many of those facing deportation fled extreme suffering in their native countries. They complained the Obama administration has detained many of them with their children in remote areas of South Texas and fast-tracked their deportation proceedings.
“It just doesn’t seem right to send back women and children who were truly fleeing for their lives, especially since the Obama administration rigged the system against these people,” said Charles Kuck, an Atlanta immigration attorney. “You are enforcing the law, but you are doing it at the consequence of human rights.”
Kuck said three of his office’s clients — a Guatemalan mother and two of her children — were arrested in Lawrenceville Saturday and now are being held in the immigration detention center in Dilley, Texas. The family fled gangs in Guatemala and unsuccessfully sought asylum in the U.S., Kuck said.
Meanwhile, immigration watchdogs are doubtful the government’s actions will make a big dent in the population of those living illegally in the U.S. Jessica Vaughan, director of policy studies for the Center for Immigration Studies, a research group that advocates tighter immigration controls, added those who are now being arrested already had their day in court.
“The concerns of the advocacy groups ring a little bit hollow,” she said, “because the individuals who have been targeted for removal in this particular action are people who have had the chance to make their case for asylum or some form of legal status before an immigration judge. And the judge has found that their request is not merited.”
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