I.C.E.'s Controversial Rise

By Christopher O'Hare and Roshan Raghavan

ICE, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, was created in 2003 and is a part of the Department of Homeland Security.  Under the current administration, ICE has had a recent spike in “popularity” due to Trump's mass deportation project. This has caused widespread panic as immigrants, even those without criminal convictions, are being deported to the harsh and cruel conditions of ICE detention centers.

Jaiden Aguilar, 701, remarked, “I think ICE is bad because they’re separating people from their families and they’re shooting people for no reason and like treating them like they are animals and they’re actually humans.”

 As of  March 5th, Trump has replaced Kristi Noem, the Department of Homeland Security’s secretary, the department which oversees ICE, with Markwayne Mullin, who is a senator of Oklahoma and a strong Trump supporter. According to an article by the Guardian, Markwayne sponsored the Laken Riley act, which mandates ICE detention for undocumented immigrants charged with theft or burglary until deportation proceedings are complete. Kristi Noem isn’t completely gone though, with a new security role called the “Special Envoy for the Shield of the Americas.” being given to Kristi Noem, who says it will go after cartels and drug traffickers in the western hemisphere.

This project’s goal is to deport undocumented immigrants, although evidence from NBC has shown that ICE has been deporting even legal citizens. They have also been killing people, most notably Renee Good, who was driving by an ICE officer and recording them. The officer shot Renee and later claimed that she was trying to ram him with her car but most people don’t actually know what really happened. 

Another person who had a very tragic death because of Border Patrol was Alex Pretti. This death intensified the hate for ICE greatly as he was a legal citizen. However, Border Patrol claims that Alex was resisting attempts to disarm his handgun .

An important thing to note before moving on in this article is that while ICE and Border Patrol are different, they frequently work together and are both a part of the Department of Homeland Security.

According to the Courthouse News Service, Kristi Noem, the secretary of homeland security, said that Alex Pretti was bringing “violence against a government because of ideological reasons and for reasons to resist and perpetuate violence.”, though an eye witness account released by the New York Times says he simply stayed recording the ICE agents.

 ICE has been impersonating police to illegally enter people's homes and make arrests. However, in NYC, it is illegal for anyone, no matter their status, to impersonate police officers. Despite this, ICE continues to use tactics like these.

Yet another tactic employed by ICE was using 5 year old Liam Ramos to detain his father. Liam and his father had just arrived home when they were detained. According to The Guardian, an agent took Liam out of the car, took Liam to his front door, and told him to knock on his door and ask to be let in. In a statement on The Guardian, the superintendent of the boy’s school said this was “in order to see if anyone else was home – essentially using a five-year-old as bait.”

Renee Good was returning home from dropping her 6 year old child off at school when she was shot and killed by ICE agent Jonathan Ross. At the time of the shooting, Jonathan was also filming the interaction. The video shows that as Renee Good’s vehicle was stopped and was obstructing traffic, Jonathan walked across the front of the car, making his way to the driver, Renee Good. During the interaction, Renee told the officer “That’s fine, dude. I’m not mad at you.” while her wife, Becca Good, said “show your face.” to the officer, as she held up her cellphone to seemingly record him. Another ICE agent told Renee Good to get out of the car. Renee Good then reversed the car, and as she started moving forward, she was shot by the ICE officer.  This rattled the community because she had legal citizenship and while yes, Renee was handling things in a bit of a rude manner, in the community's point of view it was unnecessary.

Another person who was shot and killed by a member of the Department of Homeland Security, Alex Pretti, a 37 year old intensive care nurse who was shot at least 10 times and killed by border patrol agents. Footage shows a group of civilians standing in the middle of the street talking to federal agents as they detain someone. At this time Alex Pretti is filming on his phone. An agent pushed two civilians, and then pushed the one with the orange backpack to the ground. Alex Pretti seemingly tried to get in the way of the civilians and the agent, leading to the agent pepper spraying him. Several border patrol agents grabbed Alex and wrestled him to the ground. One agent pulled a handgun from Alex Pretti and another unholstered his weapon and shot Alex in the back.

Every day the people of this country witness as a community these actions that ICE has been making, and there doesn’t seem to be an end to it in sight. According to NBC news only 25.7% of migrants in ICE detention centers actually have criminal convictions. That’s only a bit over a quarter of migrants who have been taken. This is insane because the goal of the Mass Deportation Project is to deport criminals, but when looking at these statistics we see that ICE is ignoring that. This has an incredible weight on the children because we have to worry each day if we will get deported, even if someone has an ID or is a legal citizen. You never know if ICE is just going to ignore that and label you a threat, as that’s what happened with Renee Good.  

Mason Gooden, 705, said, “It’s very demeaning and it feels like Trump is dehumanizing minorities.”