This Valentine’s Day, let’s all come together to reject the attacks on our immigrant neighbors and to let them know they are valued and loved

This Valentine’s Day, we want to share a message of love and solidarity with the immigrant community members who contribute so much to this country and are worthy of respect and dignity.

Happy Valentine’s Day to immigrant mothers like Ofelia Barajas, a Bay Area entrepreneur who got her start selling tamales on the street and now, along with her daughter Reyna Maldonado operates a popular Mexican restaurant in Oakland. Las Guerreras is so popular that the pair “opened a seafood restaurant next door in Swan’s Market specializing in ceviches,” ABC 7 News reported last year. 

“It’s so important for us to talk about our experience being undocumented here,” Maldonado said, “because I want people to really feel the strength of what it is to be an immigrant here because we live in a country that doesn’t recognize us and tries to erase us in every way possible.”

Happy Valentine’s Day to immigrant dads like Narciso Barranco, a landscaper who raised three American sons who grew up to serve their country as U.S. Marines. Following his brutal immigration arrest and detention last summer, Mr. Barranco’s worries following his release weren’t about himself, but instead about the people he met in detention and were still separated from their loved ones. “I want to tell their families they have faith,” he said, “they miss you all, and even in that place, they have hope.”

Asif Amin Cheema, another immigrant dad, deserves hope and family reunification this Valentine’s Day. The sandwich shop owner was detained and deported to Pakistan on New Year’s Day 2026 despite having an asylum application and no criminal record. His daughter told Chicago Sun-Times that she “wants Asians to speak up and band together not just with one another, but with all immigrant communities who are being targeted.”

Happy Valentine’s Day to immigrant students like Caroline Dias Goncalves, who following her unjust arrest also used her platform to advocate for others still in detention. “I hope no one else has to go through what I did. But I know that right now, over 1,300 people are still in that same nightmare in that Aurora detention facility,” she said. “They are just like me—including other people who’ve grown up here, who love this country, who want nothing more than a chance to belong.”

Happy Valentine’s Day to immigrant caregivers like Gina Policard, a home health worker originally from Haiti. She told Documented last year that she initially began her career as a way to pay the bills, but then fell in love with her work and her patients. “But I love the job because I love taking care of people the same way I do for my family,” she said. 

Immigrant caregivers like Ms. Policard are critical in providing vital services and companionship to our loved ones. In fact, they play an outsized role in this industry. “In 2019, 36.5% of all home health aides in the United States were immigrants, a rate that was twice their share of the U.S. workforce overall (17.1%),” researchers said in 2023. “This includes undocumented workers, who made up an estimated 6.9% of home health aides and 4.4% of personal care aides.” 

Happy Valentine’s Day to immigrant construction workers like Ricardo Martínez, who prides himself on helping build Dallas’ Globe Life Field, the Texas Rangers’ home. Mr. Martínez told The Dallas Morning News that he got his start “picking up trash at construction sites” before being promoted in the industry. “I am building a legacy for the city, but I am also building the example that I want to give my children: that Hispanics are good people dedicated to working,” he said. Immigrants all over this country play a critical role in the construction industry, making up roughly 2.2 million of the workers who help build our roads, schools, houses, bridges, and so much more.

Happy Valentine’s Day to immigrant farm workers like Norma, who is among the vast undocumented workforce that helps feed you and me. But despite their vital work helping sustain our nation’s food supply, the 1.2 million farmworkers who lack legal immigration status live in constant fear of family separation. “We were considered essential workers during the pandemic,” Norma said. “We paid our taxes. We followed the law. Now, we live in hiding.” 

It’s a shameful way to treat the essential workers who feed our country – rain or shine, blistering heat or penetrating cold – and quite literally keep the entire agricultural industry alive. 

Happy Valentine’s Day to immigrant neighbors helping neighbors. In Minnesota, Somali refugee Mahmoud Hasan is one of hundreds of community members who have been patrolling their neighborhoods in order to help keep their neighbors safe. For Mr. Hasan, strength is in his DNA. “We fled a civil war,” he said. “We are more resilient than they think.” This fellowship is everywhere. Following the brutal killing of Renee Nicole Good last month, “elderly Somali women handed out tea and homemade sambusas” at one protest, The Intercept reported.

Happy Valentine’s Day to mixed-status immigrant families, who face the added challenges of “foster care, displacement,” and “changes in guardianship,” as Daily Bruin noted last month. “In the U.S., 5.5 million American-born children live in a mixed-status family – a household having both residents who are undocumented and residents who have permanent legal status, according to the Center for Migration Studies.” These families deserve stability.

And, of course, happy Valentines’ Day to all immigrants everywhere who, with their hopes, dreams, and immense contributions (think $524.7 billion in total taxes annually), make us a more vibrant, stronger, and aspirational country. “Freedom took on a whole new meaning this year for William Nigira,” who became a U.S. citizen at the Saguaro National Park ceremony this past July 4 holiday. “It feels like a home,” he said. And, that’s how it should feel for him and the millions of other immigrants just like him.

This Valentine’s Day, let’s all come together to reject the attacks on our immigrant neighbors and to let them know they are valued, appreciated, and deserving of their place here in this country we all call home.

When it comes to its barbaric and deadly mass deportation agenda, the federal government has been blowing through taxpayer money like it’s going out of style, spending more than $500 million dollars to buy industrial warehouses in multiple states with a goal of transforming these structures into mass detention camps to jail our immigrant neighbors. 

The reported figures are staggering, both in scale and costs as working families all across the country continue to struggle with daily costs of living, including groceries, housing, childcare, and healthcare. And, despite that sum’s staggering size, it pales in comparison to the $170 billion in anti-immigrant funding that the federal government received last year. These planned mass detention camps come as key oversight entities have been gutted.

RED STATES, RURAL STATES ARE ALL SAYING ‘WE DO NOT WANT THEM HERE’

“The cost for acquiring two warehouses alone was $172 million,” Bloomberg reported. “A third in El Paso, Texas, could be among the largest jails of any kind in the country if completed as envisioned, with 8,500 beds. The deals mark the latest turn in US Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s plan to use as many as 23 warehouses for detaining thousands of immigrants arrested by federal agents in Minneapolis and other cities.” Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, Senior Fellow at the American Immigration Council, notes two purchases in Maryland and Pennsylvania that totalled a staggering $243 million alone. A second industrial warehouse purchase in Pennsylvania totalled $87 million. “This is unprecedented,” he notes. Again, ICE is wasting hundreds of millions of dollars as hunger is on the rise in America.

In Georgia, ICE has reportedly finalized one deal that would turn an industrial warehouse into a detention camp that could detain as many as 10,000 immigrant neighbors, more than double the capacity of the nation’s largest federal prison. “The federal government hasn’t operated a prison camp inside the United States that large since Japanese Internment,” Reichlin-Melnick writes. The Georgia camp could begin jailing immigrants as early as April despite local pushback and concerns of its impact on the city’s water and sewer infrastructure, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.

This has been a concern to many neighbors in other prospective detention camp locations, Megan Kocher wrote at Rural Organizing, noting that many of these areas “are rural and don’t have the infrastructure to sustain this.”

“The proposed detention center in Tremont, for example, will be among the largest ICE detention facilities in the country, but residents are already grappling with pollution issues that make it difficult for some to even leave their homes. Not to mention, the facility is also only a few hundred yards away from the local daycare,” Kocher wrote. She also cited concerns around the Georgia camp, including insufficient infrastructure and the proposed site’s close proximity to an elementary school.

“We’re being told that these facilities will be major job providers in our rural communities, but it’s not true,” Kocher continues. “And the potential handful of jobs they do bring can’t outweigh what they cost us. Studies show that prison construction impedes economic growth in rural counties, and I bet the same is true for these proposed detention centers.” Concerned community members have not been silent. While the federal government has been able to proceed on some purchases, local pushback from community members has succeeded in other areas of the country, including conservative regions.

“In Oklahoma City, after several protests and a packed City Council meeting, a company that had planned to sell its warehouse to ICE backed out of the deal – a move cheered by Republican Mayor David Holt,” USA Today reported. KOCO 5 News reports that more than 60 community members had voiced their concerns at the City Council meeting. Following news that the purchase had been cancelled, dozens gathered to celebrate.

“People’s voices are important. I know that a lot of people feel like their voices aren’t,” C.J. Webber-Neal, a neighbor who organized the celebration, told KOCO 5 News. “They feel like it really doesn’t matter what they think, because no one’s going to listen to them, but the actions of the mayor in contacting that company to have that discussion, proves that voices count, and I think that this is a victory for Oklahoma City.” Reagan Burns, another neighbor, said residents are “scared. People are nervous. This is too close to a school, as well, and some people were nervous about that. So, it was the community that really came, put forth and said, ‘We do not want this here.'”

In Virginia’s Hanover County, hundreds of neighbors “recently turned out in force and angrily condemned the proposed sale, with local reports suggesting only a ‘handful’ backed it,” Greg Sargent wrote in The New Republic. “The GOP-heavy Board of Supervisors opposed the transaction. The warehouse owner canceled the sale.” 

The Virginia Mercury reported that more than 500 people packed the hearing. “I’m here to tell you that your people are scared,” Mechanicsville’s Kimberly Matthews told supervisors. “This is where we stop that. This is the line in the sand. This is when we say no.” The Rev. Sterling Severns, pastor of Tabernacle Baptist Church in Richmond, said he rejoiced in news that the mass camp would not be going forward. “I love the people of this county,” he said.

EL PAÍS noted how local governments, with pressure from community members, have been working to keep the brutality of mass detention out of their communities.

“In Kansas City, Missouri — where the government planned to locate one of the largest detention centers — the city council passed a resolution in January prohibiting the construction of such facilities in the city for five years,” the report said. “In Maryland, Howard County has revoked the building permit for a private detention center that was being renovated in Elkridge, about 10 miles from Baltimore. The renovations had been underway for months without anyone knowing that the complex was intended for ICE use. As soon as the intended purpose became known, the county official announced he would push for legislation to block it.”

THIS ISN’T ABOUT PUBLIC SAFETY OR THE SO-CALLED ‘WORST OF THE WORST’

Of the massive 70,000 individuals currently in ICE custody, nearly three-quarters have no criminal convictions at all, according to TRAC Immigration. Conditions inside these facilities – many of which are operated by private prison companies under lucrative government contracts – are only going “from bad to worse” as the federal immigration officials seek to increase capacity to even more astronomical levels.

“ICE has been arresting people at courthouses when they’re trying to follow the legal process. They are profiling immigrants around the country, picking people up for the language they speak or the street corner they hang out on,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal (WA-07) said during a December shadow hearing. “So immigration detention centers are full of mothers and fathers and beloved community members while those who pose a threat are free. Amidst this surge in detention, conditions have gone from bad to worse with terrible overcrowding, unsanitary conditions, long waits to get medical help if received at all, and inedible food, described by some as ‘dripping with blood.’ Multiple pregnant women have been shackled and even suffered miscarriages due to their mistreatment in detention.”

“The case has its genesis in the ill-conceived and incompetently-implemented government pursuit of daily deportation quotas, apparently even if it requires traumatizing children,” a judge wrote in ordering Liam’s freedom

Five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos and his dad Adrian Conejo Arias are finally free and back home in Minnesota where they belong. “I’m happy to finally be going home,” Conejo Arias said according to ABC News. “Asked how he was feeling, Liam told ABC News in Spanish, ‘Good,’” the report said. Video footage shared by Rep. Joaquin Castro (TX-20) shows the family walking in freedom.

The pair were finally freed from a migrant family jail nearly two weeks after masked deportation agents used the boy as “bait” in order to detain the asylum-seekers despite the fact that they have been following the rules and have an open case. In a “scathing” ruling ordering the family’s release, U.S. District Judge Fred Biery “wrote that the father and son ‘seek nothing more than some modicum of due process and the rule of law,’” Mother Jones reported.

“The case has its genesis in the ill-conceived and incompetently-implemented government pursuit of daily deportation quotas, apparently even if it requires traumatizing children,” Judge Biery wrote, a reference to mass deportation architect-in-chief Stephen Miller’s demands that ICE sweep up 3,000 individuals per day no matter their criminal record or contributions to this country. “Observing human behavior confirms that for some among us, the perfidious lust for unbridled power and the imposition of cruelty in its quest know no bounds and are bereft of human decency,” Judge Biery continued. “And the rule of law be damned.”

Liam had reportedly fallen ill in the days before his release, suffering from a fever, vomiting and depression. “Unfortunately, Liam’s health is not doing great right now,” Zena Stenvik, superintendent for Liam’s Columbia Heights Public Schools District, said at the time. “‘So I’m very, very concerned about his well-being in that facility,’ referring to the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas, where the father and son are being detained,” People reported Jan. 29. Thankfully, Liam did not appear to require hospitalization at the time of his release.

Following news of his release, Rep. Castro, who along with Reps. Jasmine Crockett (TX-30) and Greg Casar (TX-35) had visited the family in detention and demanded their freedom, shared a heartfelt letter he wrote to the boy affirming that America is his home and is where he belongs.

“No child should have to go through what you endured,” the letter began. “But, as you get older and you understand these words and this time, I hope you will judge America not by your days at Dilley but by the millions of Americans whose hearts you touched. Years ago Robert F. Kennedy spoke of those in history who moved the world. Even as a young boy you have moved the world.”

“Your family, school, and many strangers said prayers for you and offered whatever they could do to see you back home,” Rep. Castro continued in the letter. “Don’t let anyone tell you this isn’t your home. America became the most powerful, prosperous nation on Earth because of immigrants not in spite of them.”

Rep. Castro had shared that during his visits with Liam in detention, the boy had asked about the blue bunny knit cap and Spiderman backpack that are now associated with him in the minds of Americans everywhere. One of the photos shared by Rep. Castro following the family’s release showed Liam once again wearing his blue bunny knit cap. In just one showing of public support, many images from a #Comics4Liam campaign launched by graphic artists are also depicting Liam donning that now-trademark hat.

Liam should never have been detained in the first place – and the same applies to other vulnerable kids currently at risk in the federal government’s migrant family jail system. Liam’s detention “is not an isolated incident,” as The Guardian reported Jan. 23. The number of children in ICE detention has skyrocketed under Trump’s second administration. According to The Marshall Project’s analysis of data from the Deportation Data Project, ICE now holds around 170 children on an average day—more than six times the approximately 25 children detained daily during the final 16 months of the Biden administration. Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) news further reported that two other children from Liam’s school district have also been kidnapped by federal immigration officials in recent days.

The psychological harms alone of child detention “are enormous and irreparable,” as American Immigration Council Policy Director Nanya Gupta told People. In fact, the very migrant family jail where Liam and his dad were detained is now reporting two measles cases, confirming the dire harms that detention poses to children. The Biden administration had done the right thing by phasing out the use of migrant family jails. But in March 2025, private prison profiteer CoreCivic announced a deal with the Trump administration to revive family detention by reopening the Dilley site in order to again detain children and their parents. In a series of Bluesky posts, Rep. Castro called on Dilley’s immediate closure as a matter of public health.

“Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis welcomed the father and son home in a Sunday morning Facebook post, saying, ‘We’re glad you’re back,’” San Antonio Express-News reported. “U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota also celebrated Liam’s arrival, posting a photo of herself with the boy, his father and Castro on social media. ‘Liam is home now,’ she wrote.” The Daily Beast reported that Liam’s father “wants to stay in the United States with his family, saying they fled Ecuador because they were scared to return. ‘I asked for asylum to be here for my family, for my children,’ he said. ‘I’m here because I’m scared of returning to my country.’”

“Conejo Arias added that his message to the federal government was ‘not to be so unfair with the Latino population,’ arguing it is ‘unjust’ when people who come to work and support their families are detained,” the report continued.

“I want to say I’m up here as a granddaughter of an immigrant. I wouldn’t be here,” said Best New Artist winner Olivia Dean

Music artists used their platforms to both advocate for our country’s immigrant communities and condemn the federal government’s deadly and chaotic anti-immigrant agenda during Sunday night’s 68th annual Grammy Awards.

 

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Bad Bunny received a standing ovation after opening his Best Música Urbana Album acceptance speech “with powerful words directed at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement amid rising violence,” People reported.

“Before I say thanks to God, I’m gonna say ICE out. We’re not savage. We’re not animals. We’re not aliens. We are humans and we are Americans,” he said. “The hate gets more powerful with more hate. The only thing that’s more powerful is love. We don’t hate them – we love our people, we love our family. And that’s the way to do it.”

The Puerto Rican rapper – who is also set to headline next weekend’s Super Bowl halftime show – has been vocal in his condemnation of the federal government’s brutal tactics against its own people, and announced last fall that his ongoing world tour would skip U.S. dates out of fear that masked mass deportation agents could stalk concertgoers outside his shows. Masked mass deportation agents “could be outside,” he said in September. “And it’s something that we were talking about and very concerned about.”

Singer-songwriter Billie Eilish, another performer who has been outspoken about ICE, again did not shy away from the issue following her win for Song of the Year. 

“I honestly don’t feel like I need to say anything, but no one is illegal on stolen land,” Eilish said. “It’s really hard to know what to say and what to do right now. I feel really hopeful in this room and I feel like we just need to keep fighting and speaking up and protesting. Our voices really do matter and the people matter.” People reports that Eilish was heard saying “f— ICE,” but was bleeped in the broadcast.

For several recipients, immigration is a deeply personal matter. British singer-songwriter Olivia Dean “made a point to recognize her background and her family history with immigration,” Rolling Stone reported. “I want to say I’m up here as a granddaughter of an immigrant. I wouldn’t be here,” she said during her speech accepting the award for Best New Artist. “I’m a product of bravery, and I think those people deserve to be celebrated.” 

Singer and rapper Shaboozey’s heartfelt speech following his win for Best Country Duo/Group Performance honored his immigrant mom before focusing on the overall contributions of all immigrants to the United States.

“I also want to thank my mother, who as of today, has retired from her job after 30 years working in the medical field as a registered nurse in the psych ward,” he said. “She worked three to four jobs just to provide for me and my four siblings as an immigrant in this country. Thank you, mom.”

“Immigrants built this country, literally. So this is for them,” Shaboozey continued. “For all children of immigrants, this is also for those who came to this country in search of better opportunities, to be part of a nation that promised freedom for all and equal opportunity to everyone willing to work for it. Thank you for bringing your culture, your music, your stories and your traditions. You give America color, I love y’all so much. Thank you.”

After becoming the first Spanish-language performer to win the coveted Album of the Year award, Bad Bunny “spoke extensively in Spanish except for one sentence in English,” The Minnesota Star Tribune reported. “I want to dedicate this award to all the people who had to leave their homelands and follow their dreams,” he said.

And, in red carpet remarks prior to the show, music icon and Best Tropical Latin Album winner Gloria Estefan cited lessons from the Holocaust and said that “silence is our biggest enemy,” Mediate reported.

“People, families are being torn apart, children, hundreds of children are in detention and in horrible conditions,” Estefan said. “I have personal experience with people in my circle that their loved ones have been taken away and have been months in detention for no reason because they haven’t been deported, they haven’t done anything. So no, we need to stand up,” she continued. 

Other attendees also supported immigrants by wearing pins protesting ICE, the AP reported. “Billie Eilish, Finneas and Carole King wore pins while appearing onstage. Even Justin and Hailey Bieber, who don’t normally address American politics, had them.”

 

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Americans have been doing just that in communities all across the country. In recent days, National Nurses United, the largest nurses union in the nation, organized a series of nationwide events condemning ICE and the murder of VA ICU nurse Alex Pretti. “It is a core value to advocate for our patients and our communities,” fellow ICU nurse Roxette Villegas said at one event in Los Angeles. “What Alex Pretti was going – he was doing the exact same thing. He was using his nursing experience to advocate outside of the hospital.” 

And national polling continues to show that among everyday Americans, ICE continues to hemorrhage credibility by the day.

“55% of Americans say they have very little confidence in ICE, an increase of 10 percentage points since mid-December,” YouGov said Jan. 27. “Confidence in ICE has declined most among Independents: 67% now say they have very little confidence in the agency, up from 49% in December.” Americans “are also more likely to support cuts to ICE than to other types of federal government spending: 51% want ICE funding to be decreased a lot or a little,” the polling continued.

The late Pope Francis, who died last April at the age of 88 following an illness, was a stalwart defender of the rights, dignity, and humanity of immigrants and refugees. A new joint effort by a Catholic parish and local service providers in southern California is living up to those values.

The Pope Francis Center, located across the street from Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church in San Diego’s Logan Heights, “will serve as a welcoming and supportive space that connects immigrant individuals and families with our three areas of ministry: essential resource navigation, spiritual and emotional accompaniment, and legal services,” the organization’s website said. “This center will embody Pope Francis’ vision of a church that is welcoming, una iglesia en salida, a church of encounter.”

Brinkley Johnson, manager of the Pope Francis Center, “has spent months hearing directly from church members to find out what the greatest need is,” KPBS reported. “Mental health services are something that came up repeatedly, especially for mixed-status families where the children might be U.S. citizens, but their parents are undocumented.” Nationally, an estimated 4.4 million American citizen children have at least one undocumented parent, according to the American Immigration Council.

And when a trip to the grocery store or school drop-off can now result in detention and family separation, requests for legal assistance have also been a major concern, Johnson said. In coordination with Alliance San Diego, Casa Cornelia Law Center, and the American Bar Association’s Immigration Justice Project, the Pope Francis Center hopes to address some of these concerns and help the daily lives of immigrant neighbors who help make up this vibrant community.

“What we want to do here is create a space of hope and a space for welcome,” Johnson told KPBS. “We might not be able to solve all the problems — in fact, we certainly cannot — and we aren’t able to reduce all the suffering our government is causing. But we want to offer something that is meaningful and worthwhile.”

Faith in action continues to play out in communities all across the country in recent weeks. Amid rumors that federal immigration enforcement actions may next target Haitian community members in Springfield, Ohio, locals have been organizing to protect their neighbors, The 19th reports.

“Church-supervised hubs to house and care for children separated from their parents. Phone chains to activate citizen networks if federal immigration agents are spotted in the community. Volunteers to deliver food to hungry neighbors from their own cars instead of food pantry trucks. Training on what to do if agents breach one of the churches planning to provide sanctuary to immigrant families,” the report said. “These are just some of the preparations that residents of Springfield, Ohio, have made in recent days as the country barrels toward the end of an immigration program that has allowed some 330,000 Haitians to legally live and work in the United States because of the rampant violence and political volatility in Haiti.”

In Maine, another recent target of the federal government’s mass deportation agenda, clergy formed a “spiritual ‘shield’ outside workplaces to protect immigrants from ICE,” Religion News Service reported. The Rev. Jane Field, a Presbyterian Church minister and leader from the Maine Council of Churches, said that around two dozen clergy members gathered daily over the past week to form a sort of “shield” around a local business that employs a number of immigrant neighbors. While they can not interfere with immigration actions, their presence was a moral one. Recall that when faith leaders including San Diego Bishop Michael Pham accompanied immigrants to their court dates last year, agents “scattered.”

“The rotating band of clergy has gotten used to staring down agents during what has become a twice-daily ritual, she said, with officials often driving by or sometimes lingering in the parking lot,” the Religion News Service report continued. “‘ICE has been there almost every time,’ Field said.”

Also this week, several hundred people of faith protested in Washington, D.C. to demand that federal lawmakers vote against mass deportation funding. Several of those arrested by police included clergy leaders like Unitarian Universalist Association President Rev. Dr. Sofía Betancourt.

“I am here today with my siblings of many faith traditions because we know that budgets are moral documents,” she said at the interfaith “Praying with Our Feet” event. “There is no moral justification for voting for a budget that will put more resources toward the violation and dehumanization of our neighbors. As religious leaders, we have an ethical obligation to show up and say that this will not be done in our name.” In her remarks, the Rev. Dr. Betancourt alluded to powerful demonstrations of solidarity and community all across the country.

“We are faithfully following the leadership of those who are giving everything they have to protect their neighbors,” she continued. “And we will do everything in our power to end the desecration and to restore the soul of this nation.”

ICE “messed with the wrong profession,” nurses said in taking to the streets as part of the nationwide demands for justice following the brutal murder of VA ICU nurse Alex Pretti at the hands of masked mass deportation agents in Minnesota on Jan. 24.

“Federal immigration agents have murdered one of our own, ICU registered nurse Alex Pretti, who saved veterans’ lives at the Minneapolis VA,” National Nurses United said in a statement.  “Pretti upheld his oath to advocate for and protect his patients and community to the very end as a peaceful, public legal observer of ICE atrocities.” Pretti, who carried only his phone in his hand, had been checking in on a fellow observer who’d been pepper-sprayed when a mob of agents tackled him and repeatedly shot him “point-blank.” He died at the scene.

National Nurses United, the largest nurses union in the nation, said that it was activating their members to get out  to “honor Pretti and all who have been murdered by ICE, as well as demand that Congress vote to immediately abolish this violent, racist, and lawless agency that poses a dire public health threat to all of our communities,” with rallies for accountability taking place in more than a dozen states.

At a rally outside Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center on Jan. 28, a fellow ICU nurse said that Pretti died practicing his values.

“It is a core value to advocate for our patients and our communities,” Roxette Villegas said. “What Alex Pretti was going – he was doing the exact same thing. He was using his nursing experience to advocate outside of the hospital.” Nurses and community members also rallied outside UCI Health in Orange, California. “And to see him just being shot while helping, and being, you know, practicing what he loves to do, which is caring for somebody who’s hurting, is really sad,” UCI registered nurse Marlene Tucay said through tears.

In a vigil at the Minnesota location where Pretti was gunned down by federal agents, nurse Theresa Goodfell said she felt “compelled” to visit the flower-laden site. “We all say an oath when we graduate from nursing school, and he upheld that oath until the very end,” she said.

“The impact of Pretti’s death has undoubtedly reverberated across America, but perhaps more deeply among the nation’s nurses and health care professionals, who see themselves reflected in the actions he took before his death,” The 19th reported. “It’s a sentiment that has come up again and again as nurses, a workforce dominated by women, begin mobilizing in Pretti’s name. A social media campaign, ‘Alex Pretti was one of us,’ is taking off. On the streets, nurses are protesting, holding vigils and saying Pretti’s name at strike picket lines.”

“Stories of Pretti’s life that have emerged show the role he played in supporting his women colleagues,” the report continued. “Nationally, only about 11 percent of nurses are men. Dr. Avalon Swenson, a resident physician in Minnesota, recently recounted working with Pretti at the VA ICU, where he ‘made a point of asking my opinion and making sure my patients had what they needed without my asking.’”

71-year-old Air Force veteran Sonny Fouts said Pretti was his ICU nurse when he underwent a descending aorta aneurysm repair procedure just weeks ago. He and his loved ones remembered his compassionate bedside manner and have been very affected by his death, People reported.

“I walked in, and Sonny’s just hooked up to so many machines and needles and tubes, and Alex was his nurse and he just lightened the situation,” his partner Kimberly told People. “There are nurses who come in and don’t really say anything, and Alex was not like that. I appreciated that I immediately felt comfortable with him. And I felt that Sonny was in good hands.”

“The veteran tells PEOPLE he’s had a headache and a stomach ache, as well as trouble sleeping, since he learned what happened to Pretti,” the report continued. “I don’t like looking at the TV about it. I don’t want to read any newspaper stories,” Fouts said. “I don’t use the word ‘hero,’ but I guess I could say that.”

Pretti’s death and the heartfelt words from his former colleagues and patients are reminders that when one member of our national community gets attacked, it affects all of us. And when the very people who help care for us have already been doing so under strenuous workplace circumstances that show no sign of improving any time soon, they deserve better. “We’re a profession where our purpose in life is to be the caretakers of society — the caretakers of people,” National Nurses United president and ICU nurse Mary Turner told The 19th. “That involves so much mental, emotional, physical, spiritual effort, that when something like what happened to Alex happens, it is a devastating blow to our very soul.”

From delivering groceries to families who can’t leave their homes to patrolling the streets as part of ICE watches, Minneapolis neighbors and community members are coming to each other’s aid – and inspiring the rest of us.

Since December, Iglesia Dios Habla Hoy, which serves the area’s Latino community members, has been hard at working helping feed families who can’t leave their homes amid the federal government’s violent overreach. When Pastor Sergio Amezcua “first asked his assistant to put out a call on social media, he thought they would receive a few requests,” KARE 11 reported. “Right now, they’re distributing anywhere between 50,000 and 70,000 pounds of food per week with the help of hundreds of volunteers.”

It’s not just assistance with meals, either. When Rev. Amezcua found out that one community member was resorting to reusing disposable diapers, he leapt into action. “I sent a text, if you can donate diapers,” he told KARE 11. “Our volunteer force showed up with what you see here.”

This fire is everywhere. Somali neighbors who have time and time again been the target of racist slander by the administration are responding not with fear but with courage, “from homemade sambusas for protesters to foot patrols on the lookout for ICE,” The Intercept reported. Like Iglesia Dios Habla Hoy, community member Abdi Rahman said this includes buying and delivering groceries for families unable to safely step outside their front doors.

“When ICE started showing up in our neighborhoods, we realized we can’t fight the federal government. But we can come together and patrol the neighborhood, keep ICE out, deescalate,” he told The Intercept. Many of these community members have been here before. Resiliency is a part of their DNA.

“Mahmoud Hasan, a community activist whom everyone refers to as BBC, was in a refugee camp after fleeing civil strife in Somalia in the 1990s,” the report continued. “He earned his moniker because, living in the camp, he learned English strictly by watching the BBC and would practice by speaking like a news anchor. ‘We fled a civil war,’ Hasan said. ‘We are more resilient than they think.’”

This energy is also manifesting across the state on Friday, January 23, in the form a “Day of Truth and Freedom,” which is encouraging all Minnesotans – and all of Americans outraged over daily abuses of power at the hands of the federal government – to come “together in moral reflection” and skip work, school, and shopping.

“The ICE ‘surge’ that cost the life of Renee Nicole Good is violating the Constitutional and human rights of Americans and our neighbors,” states the action’s website. “It is time to suspend the normal order of business to demand immediate cessation of ICE actions in MN, accountability for federal agents who have caused loss of life and abuse to Minnesota residents and call for Congress to immediately intervene.”

The day of action is truly unprecedented. Labor outlet Payday Report said that “tens of thousands of workers in Minneapolis are expected to take to the streets in a mass general strike. The ‘Day of Truth and Freedom’ has been endorsed by all the major labor organizations in Minnesota. Every major school and cultural institution, as well as hundreds of restaurants and small businesses, are expected to close.”

CWA Local 7520 President Kieran Knutson said “that the idea of a general strike emerged when SEIU Local 26 proposed a mass day of action to a group of progressive unions,” the report said. “SEIU Local 26, whose members are largely immigrant janitorial workers, sought help from other unions in fighting back as their members took a beating from ICE raids.” Knutson said that after Good’s killing, “I think a lot of us said, we have to move. We have to do stuff now.”

Faith leaders are participating in the strike, with religion reporter Jack Jenkins highlighting that many are staging a protest outside the Minneapolis airport. “Side note: It is — and I cannot stress this enough — literally extremely cold,” he noted. But the weather has met its match, with Jenkins noting that the crowd continued to grow to the point of pouring out into the street.

Hundreds of clergy members have also descended across the city this week to help observe federal immigration actions. “The clergy, who hail from a range of traditions and worship communities across the country, sang on the buses as they ventured out into the street. They belted out hymns and songs popular during the Civil Rights Movement, such as ‘Woke Up This Morning,’” Religion News Service reported.

The Rev. James Galasinski, who came in from New York, said he and several other faith leaders had been out monitoring for just a few minutes when they witnessed a dozen mass deportation agents harass an individual who appeared to be an American citizen.

“The ministers — all wearing clerical stoles — began blowing whistles, attempting to alert the nearby community. ICE agents surrounded one of the women from the minivan and instructed the pastors to get back,” the report said. Rev. Dan Brockway, “standing behind the other faith leaders, began livestreaming the encounter to his church’s Facebook page.” When the woman was able to produce paperwork, she was let go. “I saw it,” said Rev. Galasinski. “I mean, demanding papers? I never thought I would live in a country like this.”

Religion News Service also reported that at least 100 rabbis and Jewish leaders are among the faith leaders defending Minneapolis neighbors. Rabbi Diane Tracht, who arrived from Indiana, called it a commandment of her faith and Jewish experience. “What did we learn from the Holocaust? We have to act and we have to resist,” she said. “If I’m not going to act and resist now, then I shouldn’t call myself a rabbi and I can’t be a proud Jew.”

Es difícil creer que el presidente apenas cumplió este 20 de enero el primer año de su segunda administración porque su efecto ha sido tan devastador en tantos frentes, globales y domésticos, que parece que han transcurrido años. Y lo que falta.

Los inmigrantes se han llevado la peor parte de una guerra sin cuartel que es un monstruo de varias cabezas que nos ataca a todos de una forma u otra. Porque los inmigrantes no operan en un vacío. Son parte de familias, comunidades, la economía, y todo se ha visto adversamente afectado.

Lo que comenzó como una campaña de detenciones y deportaciones supuestamente de “criminales”, se tornó en una amplia red de terror sustentada en el uso ilegítimo de perfiles raciales que se lleva por delante a residentes autorizados y a ciudadanos estadunidenses forzados a llevar consigo pasaportes para probar su ciudadanía y ni eso los ha salvado de ser abusados por agentes migratorios. Se violentan el debido proceso de ley, el estado de derecho y la Constitución.

En este primer año Trump sentó las bases de una peligrosa militarización de ciudades y estados dirigidos por demócratas desplegando guardias nacionales para asistir a agentes de ICE y de CBP, enmascarados y en autos sin identificar, que abusan de su autoridad tornándose cada vez más violentos al grado de matar a tiros a una ciudadana estadounidense, Renee Nicole Good, en Minneapolis. Ninguna de las ciudades sitiadas solicitó asistencia del gobierno federal.

Es una estrategia de provocación donde el propio gobierno federal promueve el caos para generar violencia que justifique invocar medidas extremas como la Ley de Insurrección que le permite al presidente desplegar el Ejército a nivel doméstico. Trump lleva tiempo amenazando a ciudades como Minneapolis con la Ley de Insurrección.

Con sus bajos índices de popularidad y la posibilidad de perder el control de la Cámara Baja y potencialmente del Senado en las elecciones intermedias, no se descarta que Trump trate incluso de decretar la ley marcial cuando las Fuerzas Armadas asumen el control de una zona específica o de todo el país y se suspenden todas las leyes y los derechos civiles, incluidas las elecciones.

En materia migratoria, Trump se ha valido mayormente de órdenes ejecutivas para sustentar cambios que buscan reducir e incluso eliminar los mecanismos para inmigrar o permanecer legalmente en Estados Unidos, desde el asilo y el refugio, hasta programas como el TPS, el parole humanitario y la concesión de visas de inmigrantes, visas de trabajo y otros. Ha deslegalizado a millones de inmigrantes para hacerlos vulnerables a la deportación.

“El Instituto de Política Migratoria (MPI) estima que la administración Trump, en el primer año de su segundo mandato, tomó más de 500 medidas en materia de inmigración, superando las 472 medidas tomadas durante los cuatro años del primer mandato de Trump”, concluye un análisis del MPI.

Aparte de deslegalizar a millones de inmigrantes que tenían protección de deportación, permisos de trabajo y pagaban impuestos, también ha impedido que otros millones puedan ajustar su estatus. Ha cancelado ceremonias de naturalización.

Ha deportado a 622,000 inmigrantes, algunos a países con los cuales no tienen ningún vínculo. Todavía no llegan al millón de deportados al año como se han impuesto. Otros se han autodeportado. La cifra de detenidos ronda los 73,000, la más alta en 25 años. Y la mayor parte no tiene historial criminal.

Aunque algunas medidas han sido frenadas en tribunales de menor instancia, la Corte Suprema ha sido más favorable hacia Trump. Uno de los casos pendientes más esperados es el de eliminar la ciudadanía por derecho de nacimiento a bebés de padres indocumentados.

En un solo año la política migratoria de Trump ha causado daños devastadores no solo a las familias separadas sino a las comunidades que sufren el embate y la economía que se ve afectada por la reducción de trabajadores y de consumidores que paguen impuestos y auspicien negocios. La seguridad pública sufre por el desvío de fondos y personal a labores  migratorias.

“Es innegable que el primer año de Trump 2.0 ha traído consigo algunos de los cambios más profundos en la política de inmigración de la historia moderna, y la administración tiene tres años por delante para profundizar su impacto. Queda por ver si estos cambios representarán un desvío temporal o un cambio fundamental en el futuro del país”, concluyó el análisis del MPI.

La interrogante y la preocupación es qué sigue. Cuando se toca fondo la alternativa es subir. Un cambio de mando en el Congreso podría servir de contrapeso al asalto de Trump sentando las bases para reformas migratorias que por décadas ambos partidos evadieron, algo que ahora muchos lamentan.

The 56-year-old American citizen who was wrongfully detained by mass deportation agents and dragged out of his home into the bitter cold in nothing but his underwear, Crocs, and a thin open blanket says he feels “fear, shame and desperation” after the dehumanizing ordeal at the hands of an overreaching federal government, Reuters reports.

ChongLy Thao, a naturalized U.S. citizen who goes by “Scott” and is of Hmong descent, was not even a target of ICE’s operation. In fact, reporting would later reveal that one of the men pursued by the agency is already in prison. Mr. Thao’s family said that they don’t know the individuals that federal agents claimed to be pursuing, nor do these individuals live at the residence. Instead, “it appears Thao was taken half-naked in 10 degree weather simply because he’s Asian,” independent journalist Marisa Kabas reported.

“Shortly after the men busted down Thao’s door, they came out with their supposed target in hand: A short, elderly, half-naked man being marched out of his home,” Kabas reported. “Photos from that moment show his grandson looking out the window, a pacifier in his mouth.” The photo showed Mr. Thao wrapped in a thin, open blanket that he’d grabbed from his grandson after ICE agents cruelly denied him a chance to put on some clothes to shield him from the Minnesota winter. “The highest temperature in Saint Paul on Sunday was 14 degrees Fahrenheit,” Reuters said.

Mr. Thao was eventually released from custody “without explanation or apology,” Reuters continued. “I was praying. I was like, God, please help me, I didn’t do anything wrong,” he said. “Why do they do this to me? Without my clothes on.”

TIME TO STOP THE ‘KAVANAUGH STOPS’

It’s a question that Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh should have to answer himself, after authoring a concurrence in the Supreme Court shadow docket ruling that gives mass deportation agents the green light to racially profile and harass Americans like Mr. Thao. In his concurrence, Kavanaugh insisted that any wrongful targeting of U.S. citizens by ICE would prove nothing more than a mild inconvenience. “If the officers learn that the individual they stopped is a U. S. citizen or otherwise lawfully in the United States,” Kavanaugh wrote, “they promptly let the individual go.”

Mr. Thao isn’t the only recently detained American who might disagree with Kavanaugh’s claim. “A combat-wounded Army veteran says federal immigration agents detained him for about eight hours after he watched an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrest from a public sidewalk in south Minneapolis,” KARE 11 reports. William Vermie, “who served in Iraq and was awarded a Purple Heart, said he was standing on a sidewalk observing agents arresting two people when he says officers began pushing bystanders back.”

The veteran said that when he didn’t move quickly enough, he was detained by multiple agents and was subsequently denied a phone call while in custody. “They did offer bathroom breaks and water breaks, and I did ask for a band-aid and they gave it to me,” Vermie told KARE 11. “But I’d rather have a lawyer than a band-aid when I’m being detained.”

“I have represented people accused of the most horrific crimes,” his attorney told the outlet, “and I have never encountered the type of stonewalling, deliberate stonewalling and delay, that I experienced in trying to see Will.”

MAKING AMERICA WEAKER, POORER, LESS SAFE

“One year into his second term, it’s crystal clear that Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant agenda is making America weaker, poorer and less safe – from a failing economy to families being torn apart to an assault on our cities and our due process rights,” America’s Voice Executive Director Vanessa Cárdenas said this week, noting that the administration’s anti-immigrant obsessions have served as the “tip of the spear” for a “broader assault on the rights and civil liberties of all Americans.”

In October, ProPublica said its investigation found more than 170 cases where U.S. citizens were detained at raids and protests. “Americans have been dragged, tackled, beaten, tased and shot by immigration agents. They’ve had their necks kneeled on. They’ve been held outside in the rain while in their underwear.” Or in the case of Mr. Thao, in the snow while in his underwear.

The attacks against our neighbors and their freedoms regardless of legal immigration status have only worsened since the article’s publishing in the fall. “Fed agent permanently blinds, fractures skull of anti-ICE protester,” the New Republic reported Jan 14. “Woman dragged from car by ICE agents yells ‘I’m disabled’ in chaotic scene in Minneapolis,” The Independent said that same day. On Jan. 7, an ICE agent brutally shot and killed Renee Nicole Good, a Minnesota mom of three. “ICE agents have shot at least nine people in their vehicles since September,” Common Dreams reported. Just days after Good’s killing, an ICE agent reportedly invoked the mom and award-winning poet in order to intimidate another observer. “You guys gotta stop obstructing us, that’s why that lesbian b—— is dead,” the agent said according to MPR News.

“From normalizing the massive domestic deployment of armed and masked federal agents, and in some cases military troops, against the will of American communities; to the targeting and persecution of citizens and non-citizens alike; to the subversion of due process rights and First Amendment protections are just a few examples of the assault on America,” Cárdenas continued. “This administration is engaging in deliberate provocations – relying on the pretext of immigration – that raise the possibility of violence, trample on core democratic traditions and aim to keep our nation needlessly divided.”

The federal government keeps showing us that no one is safe – including Americans who fled here for safety in the first place. Mr. Thao was born in Laos and was brought here by his parents in 1974  when he was just four. “We came here for a purpose, right,” he told Reuters. “To have a bright future. To have a safe place to live. If this is going to turn out to be America, what are we doing here? Why are we here?”

AMERICANS ARE FIGHTING BACK AGAINST TRUMP’S OVERREACH

But even in the face of these dangers and threats, Americans are showing more courage and bravery than many with much more power and are saying they will keep each other safe. The weekend after Good’s death, Americans took part in more than 1,000 events to demand accountability and justice for their neighbors

“We do not need to accept what is happening in our country and in our own community,” Sister Suzie Armbruster said at a Scranton, Pennsylvania rally. “We stand strong and believe that good people overtake evil. We hold everything in our hearts. We hold all of our brothers and sisters, no matter where they’re from. We hold all of them … those that are living right here in our own community. We remember Renee Good. We remember all those that have been victims of violence, and we know that we can join our hearts and voices in a peaceful way.” Tempe resident Laurie Green told ABC15 Arizona that she was “standing up for my neighbors. I am not happy with what happened in Minneapolis.” The protests are “heartening,” said Phoenix resident Kelly Carmody. “I hope many others show up and share what they think should be done.’”

This month marks one year since a series of wildfires devastated the Los Angeles area, killing as many as 440 people, displacing more than 200,000 residents, and causing more than $53 billion dollars in damage. But even in the midst of this catastrophic devastation, there were small glimmers in hope. Just look at the immigrant and Latino community members who gathered buckets and hoses to help try to stop the devastation from spreading, as we noted last year.

Housekeeper Maria Garcia told NPR at the time that she didn’t even live in the neighborhood where a reporter for the outlet took a picture of her hosing down some rubble. Garcia, who is undocumented, said she just couldn’t stop thinking about the devastation hitting the region she calls home and felt like she had to do something.

“She couldn’t sleep Tuesday night knowing houses there were burning. So she got out of bed early Wednesday and said to her children: ‘Let’s go help, if we can,’” the report said. “She called her brothers and some friends and they all gathered buckets and hoses and drove into a part of the Altadena community where houses were ablaze. Then they got to work putting out fires.”

“Our values and our principles come first, that’s what our parents taught us,” she told NPR. “They always used to say, help others without concern for who they are or why they need help.” Juan Carlos Pascual Tolentino, another immigrant volunteer, told NPR that documentation is irrelevant when it comes to helping a neighbor. “When you support someone, you strengthen your union with them,” he said. “When you stop and ask if they could use a hand, they’ll remember that.”

Immigrant workers have historically been critical to disaster recovery efforts. Following Hurricane Michael’s devastation in 2019, immigrant workers “toiled day and night” across Florida’s Bay County “to reopen Panama City’s City Hall, repair the local campus of Florida State University and fix damaged roofs on several churches,” The New York Times reported at the time. In fact, immigrant workers have been so essential to disaster recovery, that a statue in New Orleans honors the Latino workers, many also foreign-born, who helped rebuild the city following Katrina.

“Like farm workers in the fields, immigrants are indispensable to fire, flood and hurricane recovery in the US,” Saket Soni, executive director of disaster response organization Resilience Force, told The Guardian last year. “There is absolutely no rebuilding without them.”

Yet the federal government has impeded recovery efforts by targeting the very workers who are critical to our nation’s ability to rebound from disasters such as the L.A. wildfires. “Day laborers who are helping families rebuild in the Eaton Fire zones are scared to go to work, fearing to encounter federal immigration agents,” NBC 4 Los Angeles reported Jan. 9. “Standing in front of an Altadena home that was burned down in the 2025 wildfire, Jose Madera, director for the Pasadena Community Job Center, said the construction process has been delayed as workers are afraid that they may be targeted in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations.”

“These ICE raids, this hate and terror into our community. Masked men, armed, in unmarked cars are coming into our community. That’s halting the recovery,” Madera said. “That’s halting the rebuilding. That’s halting families to come back to their community.”

Just look at the terrifying mass deportation efforts that have been ongoing at the area’s Home Depot stores, which have long been a hub for immigrant workers and prospective employers specializing in construction. “These same lots have become key targets for immigration enforcement,” the Los Angeles Times reported in November. The administration’s unlawful invasion last summer expanded these dangers beyond the store chain’s parking lots. 

The New York Times reported this past summer how one team of day laborers that had been working to decontaminate homes affected by the fires had no choice but to stay home following a nearby raid that made their essential work too risky to carry out that day.

“Sweating in masks and protective suits, they vacuumed toxic soot and ash, wiped down books and framed photos, and disposed of clothes and furniture that could not be salvaged,” the July 2025 report said. “One morning last month, they crammed into a small job center in Pasadena, Calif., ready for more work. But on this day, the situation felt too dangerous.”

This entirely preventable distress resulting from the federal government’s mass deportation agenda has not been unique to L.A., either. This past summer, a trio of economists noted that employment in construction had dropped in the ten states with the highest reliance on unauthorized workers. In Alabama, construction site superintendent Robby Robertson said he lost money after raids in nearby Florida scared off his workers. “Even though nearly two months have passed since then, he said a little more than half of his workforce has come back,” Common Dreams reported in July.

The dangers facing not just immigrant workers but everyone who calls this country home have only become more pronounced as L.A. remains in need of the skilled labor of immigrant workers. While the region “is showing signs of recovery,” “post-traumatic stress and avoidance of public life remain a part of life for many residents,” said the USC Schaeffer Institute for Public Policy & Government Service. “Over 50% of L.A. County residents say they or someone they know has avoided public places, transit, work or school, medical care, or legal/government services due to safety concerns or recent events.”

The workers who are helping L.A. slowly bounce back deserve our thanks and the opportunity to continue thriving here, not to get kicked out of the community they’re helping to rebuild one hammer at a time.

The federal government’s mission to make as many immigrants deportable as possible rages on, after the administration announced it would seek to end temporary protections for Somali immigrants despite conditions remaining dire in Somalia by the federal government’s own admission.

“Country conditions in Somalia have improved to the point that it no longer meets the law’s requirement for Temporary Protected Status,” the Department of Homeland Security claimed in a Jan. 13 statement, urging Somali immigrants who’ve had permission to live and work in the U.S. to self-deport. “Somali nationals who do not have a legal status other than TPS that would allow them to remain in the United States should use the U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s CBP Home mobile app to report their departure from the United States.”

But at the same time, State Department officials have issued a red alert urging Americans to not travel to Somalia, citing “crime, terrorism, civil unrest, health, kidnapping, piracy, and lack of availability of routine consular services.” 

“Due to security risks,” the State Department’s level four “Do Not Travel” alert continues, “U.S. government employees working in Somalia are prohibited from traveling outside the Mogadishu International Airport complex where the U.S. Embassy is located.” The level four alert is the most severe warning the federal government can issue.

This double-speak should come as no surprise. The federal government has also refused to reinstate TPS for Venezuela despite worsening conditions there following a deadly and unlawful military operation that has plunged the Latin American nation into uncertainty. Like in the case of Somalia, the federal government has claimed that Venezuela “today is more free than it was yesterday” and that Venezuelan immigrants should “go home.” U.S. citizens, however, are also being instructed by the State Department to stay away. 

“Do not travel to or remain in Venezuela due to the high risk of wrongful detention, torture in detention, terrorism, kidnapping, arbitrary enforcement of local laws, crime, civil unrest, and poor health infrastructure,” reads the level four travel alert. And while some U.S. workers continue to work out of the U.S. embassy in Somalia, all Americans are being “strongly advised” to leave Venezuela immediately. “Do not travel to Venezuela for any reason,” the alert says in bold writing.

In a statement, the California chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-CA) called the federal government’s effort to terminate Somali TPS the “latest bigoted attack on the Somali community.” As The New York Times reported in December, “Trump has a history of insulting people from African countries, but the outburst was shocking in its unapologetic bigotry.” During that rant, Trump called Somali neighbors “garbage” and people that “complain and do nothing but bitch, we don’t want them in our country.”

“Ending Somali TPS defies both logic and the basic purpose of the program,” said CAIR-CA CEO Hussam Ayloush. “The U.S. State Department continues to designate Somalia as a Level 4 ‘Do Not Travel’ country due to the lack of basic security conditions that would place returning Somali TPS holders at constant risk through no fault of their own. Somalia remains a country that has endured decades of civil war, ongoing instability, and persistent threats from armed groups. Conditions on the ground have not meaningfully improved … This is not policy driven by facts; it is a political attack, and it puts lives at risk.”

Ifraax Saciied-Ciise, executive director of Maine-based IFKA Community Services, told WMTW News 8 that she was “very, very disappointed to hear that people who come here to seek protection and for them to deny them those protections.”

“Somali people are great people. They are hardworking. They are here for the American dream, like everybody else came here for the American dream,” Saciied-Ciise said. “And we’re here to add value to the economy and the community.” FWD.us noted in a report last year that TPS holders “contribute about $21 billion annually to the U.S. economy, in addition to the payment of $5.2 billion in combined federal, payroll, state, and local taxes.”

“Congress must intervene to block the termination of TPS for Somalia and conduct oversight of this discriminatory policy, and immigration courts must halt removals and uphold the rule of law,” CAIR-CA’s Ayloush continued. “This is not policy driven by facts; it is a political attack, and it puts lives at risk.” 

Leaders like Miami Mayor Eileen Higgins have also called for the reinstatement of Venezuelan TPS, saying that the “instability unfolding in Venezuela today makes it even clearer that the country remains unsafe for people to return.” Sebastian, a Venezuelan TPS holder who asked to be identified by his first name only, told NPR that he initially welcomed the news of Maduro’s removal from power. But he said his relief quickly turned to worry when he heard about U.S. plans to work with Maduro’s right-hand person, NPR said. Sebastian, an architect who calls Miami home, “said he feels the danger is still as present in Venezuela.” Luis Falcón, another Venezuelan migrant, said that “putting a foot back in Venezuela means I will be taken to jail, tortured, and potentially killed.”

“No one should be forced back into chaos and uncertainty,” Mayor Higgins said. TPS holders “have built lives here, contributed to our community, and deserve the security to remain while their homeland regains stability. This is not just a matter of policy — it is a matter of basic human dignity and safety.”

“What happens when you do minimal screening before hiring agents, arming them, and sending them into the streets? We’re all finding out”

After nearly a month in ICE detention, Maryland-born mom Dulce Consuelo Díaz Morales is finally free and reunited with her loved ones.

The Washington Post reports that Díaz Morales was released from custody on Jan. 7, a full 25 days after she went to grab a bite at a fast food restaurant only to be targeted and swept up by mass deportation agents. While Díaz Morales tried to tell officers that she was a U.S. citizen, her claim was ignored. According to her attorney, Victoria Slatton, federal immigration officials accused her of faking her Maryland birth certificate and refused to release her from custody.

“Four days after her arrest, a Maryland District Court judge barred the government from deporting Diaz Morales while the court considered a petition from her lawyers challenging the detention,” The Post reported. But rather than free this wrongfully detained American, “Diaz Morales was transferred often and held in five detention centers in Maryland, Louisiana, Texas and, finally, New Jersey. Her lawyers were only able to speak to her twice during her detention, Slatton said.”

“Díaz Morales said she lived in Mexico starting at age seven and returned to the US more than a year and a half ago,” The Guardian reported. “She believes confusion arose because she used her mother’s last name while living in Mexico, whereas US records list both her father’s and mother’s last names.”

Whatever the confusion about last names, her Maryland birth certificate and immunization record from Anne Arundel County should have been enough to confirm her citizenship status. Instead, as we’ve seen in one instance after another since last year, her very identity as an American was put into doubt. Diaz Morales would end up missing the winter holidays with her son and loved ones. After nearly a month in custody, she was finally released.

“On Wednesday evening, Diaz Morales was being driven home to Maryland by her lawyers. She said she was looking forward to seeing her 5-year-old son and the rest of her family,” The Post continued. “Now that I am free, I feel much better, but while I was detained, the lows were really low and I felt very sad, but I thank God now it’s over,” she said. “I want to hug my son first and then my family.”

Her reunification with her family and friends comes as the nation has been outraged over ICE’s brutal killing of Renee Nicole Good, an unarmed American citizen, in Minneapolis on Jan. 7. Over the weekend, some 1,000 events across the country demanded justice for this award-winning poet, wife and mom of three. “I’m standing up for my neighbors,” said one attendee in Tempe, Arizona. “I am not happy with what happened in Minneapolis.”

But the federal government’s reaction hasn’t been to announce a thorough probe into the officer’s use of deadly force, but instead to shockingly push an investigation into Good’s widow Becca Good (in fact, six prosecutors resigned rather than take part in this despicable targeting) and make all Minnesotans less safe by deploying even more mass deportation agents into the state. We already knew that the Big, Ugly Budget funneled billions upon billions to ICE. What’s also true is that the federal government’s mass deportation fixation is endangering all of us by prioritizing mass deportation over bringing to justice drug traffickers, domestic extremists, and child predators.

“FBI agents reassigned to round up immigrants have had to walk away from investigations into violent predators who target and exploit children online,” MSNBC reported in September, with data revealing that the federal government pulled more than 2,800 agents from crime-fighting investigations in order to help carry out mass deportations and the “Kavanaugh stops” that have resulted in the unjust detention of Americans like Dulce Consuelo Díaz Morales.

But other federal law enforcement agencies that have been working to combat actual threats to our safety have also been stretched thin as well. Roughly 50% of DEA agents have been reassigned from targeting drug cartels and fentanyl traffickers in order to help ramp up deportation numbers. Over at the ATF,  80% of the agency’s 2,500 agents have been pulled into targeting hardworking immigrant moms and dads, stretching resources thin and diverting focus from investigating gun trafficking, bombings, and arson.

And at HSI – the investigative arm of the Department of Homeland Security – the agency’s 7,000 agents have been reassigned to mass deportation at the expense of investigating terrorism, child exploitation, and human trafficking.

The federal government is also making an already-deadly ICE even more dangerous by hiring individuals that are unqualified for any type federal law enforcement position, period. That includes “using white nationalist imagery and language to recruit new employees and arrest immigrants,” the Southern Poverty Law Center said in August. “In some cases, the images and language appear to come directly from antisemitic and neo-Nazi publications and a white Christian nationalist website.”

“What happens when you do minimal screening before hiring agents, arming them, and sending them into the streets? We’re all finding out,” Slate’s Laura Jedeed wrote this week. She revealed that she recently applied at the agency in order to find out more about the hiring process. But to Jedeed’s shock, ICE offered her a job despite the fact that she never submitted any paperwork, never completed a background check, and likely failed a drug test. “To be clear, I barely applied to ICE. I skipped the steps of the application process that would have clued the agency in on my lack of fitness for the position.”

“How many convicted domestic abusers are being given guns and sent into other people’s homes?” Jedeed continued. “How many people with ties to white supremacist organizations are indiscriminately targeting minorities on principle, regardless of immigration status? How many rapists and pedophiles are working in ICE detention centers with direct and unsupervised access to a population that will be neither believed nor missed? How are we to trust ICE’s allegedly thorough investigations of the people they detain and deport when they can’t even keep their HR paperwork straight?”

It’s a question that should worry any American who cherishes their personal freedoms, their neighbors, and their very ability to live in peace and safety. The costs to our daily lives are rapidly rising, as other headlines from this past week alone show us. “Fed agent permanently blinds, fractures skull of anti-ICE protester,” the New Republic reported. “Woman dragged from car by ICE agents yells ‘I’m disabled’ in chaotic scene in Minneapolis,” The Independent said. “You guys gotta stop obstructing us, that’s why that lesbian b—— is dead,” one agent reportedly told an observer, referring to Renee Nicole Good, MPR News reported. The outlet said one observer was “asked to provide the names of people he knows that are undocumented or the names of protest organizers in exchange for money or legal protection.”

And while Díaz Morales is now free, her nightmare is nowhere close to over. “Slatton said the case against Diaz Morales has not yet been dismissed by the government and she could still face deportation proceedings,” The Post continued. “But Slatton is confident her client’s claim to citizenship has been established.”

“She is a U.S. citizen. She was born here. I think that we’ve presented more than enough evidence, but we will continue to fight it until every single court accepts and acknowledges it,” she said.

“When thousands of over-militarized immigration agents descend on American communities akin to an invading military force, it seeks to terrorize us, actively harms public safety and raises the likelihood of violence,” said America’s Voice Executive Director Vanessa Cárdenas. “Meanwhile, the mass deportation agenda is diverting money, manpower, investigative attention and resources away from real threats – like child exploitation, drug trafficking investigations and FEMA disaster preparedness funding – all for the purpose of becoming foot soldiers in Stephen Miller’s anti-immigrant crusade.”