IMMIGRANT ADVOCATES SAID they are troubled by federal immigration agents’ latest tactics in San Francisco after at least 15 people, including four children, were detained this week when they showed up for scheduled check-ins and appointments at a U.S. immigration office.
It could be a sign that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is seeking ways to fill quotas, said Milli Atkinson, director of the Immigrant Legal Defense Program of the Justice & Diversity Center of the Bar Association of San Francisco.
“We think it has to do with quotas and directives from higher-ups, showing that local ICE offices will be penalized if they’re not hitting a certain number of arrests every day,” Atkinson said during a press conference Thursday. “And calling people in who they know will show up voluntarily is the easiest way for them to detain people.”
Punished for following rules
Atkinson said it was “particularly concerning” that ICE was targeting people who have never shown any sign of being a flight risk.
At least 15 people, the youngest a 3-year-old child, were taken into custody after appearing Wednesday for check-ins and appointments at the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services offices at 630 Sansome St. They didn’t have criminal records and were following directions of ICE and immigration courts, the immigrant advocates said.
The detainees consisted of at least three families — three mothers with their children — who had to sleep on the floor overnight in cells at the offices, advocates said. They have since been taken to the Golden State Annex ICE detention center in McFarland in Kern County or to the Dilley Immigration Processing Center in Texas.
The offices on Sansome Street are separate from the San Francisco immigration court on Montgomery Street, where ICE agents took four people into custody last week.
One of the families detained Wednesday was a 25-year-old woman with two children, according to the woman’s sister, who spoke under the pseudonym Yaneth through a translator at the press conference Thursday.
She said her sister had been wearing an ankle monitor and was complying with all appointments and regulations from ICE. Yaneth said she was worried about the conditions, and that the children weren’t attending school.
“There’s supposed to be rules for children. They’re not supposed to suffer cold, hunger, sleeping on the floor. To me this is wrong,” she said. “My sister and her children are good people.”
‘Outrageous and unforgivable’
U.S. Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, said Thursday that ICE was “stupid” for arresting people who were complying with the law and cooperating with law enforcement by reporting for regularly scheduled check-ins with ICE.
She said ICE’s “ineffective renegade behavior” called for more oversight of the agency.
“The traumatic impact these detainments will have on these families — including a three-year-old child — who are being detained for obeying the law is outrageous and unforgivable,” Pelosi said. “This menacing conduct will instill fear in immigrants who have scheduled future check-ins with ICE officials and their trepidation may deter them from pursuing lawful pathways. Clearly ICE does not place a value on our responsibility to the wellbeing of families.”
Media representatives for ICE didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday evening about the San Francisco detentions this week.
Immigrant advocates said they couldn’t get answers at the immigration office on Wednesday about reasons for the detentions, said Priya Patel, supervising attorney with the California Collaborative for Immigrant Justice.
Patel said that after several inquiries, she learned on Thursday afternoon that one family had been shipped to the Dilley Immigration Processing Center in Texas. The family had been checking in with immigration officials on a regular basis and posed no flight risk.
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