TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ABDUCTS ANOTHER UNIVERSITY STUDENT
In a terrifying escalation of the Trump administration’s attacks on immigrants, plainclothes and masked individuals identifying themselves as federal agents abducted Tufts University student Rumeysa Ozturk in broad daylight as she was walking to an interfaith center to break her Ramadan fast. The masked officers, who emerged from unmarked vehicles, forcibly detained her, taking her away without explanation or due process. This is not an isolated incident. Across the country, students with legal status, like Ozturk in Massachusetts and another doctoral student in Alabama who was taken from his home early Tuesday morning, are being detained without warning, due process, or clear justification. Lawmakers in the state have issued swift condemnations. Rep. Ayanna Pressley called Ozturk’s detention “a horrifying violation” of constitutional rights, while Sen. Elizabeth Warren warned that the administration “is targeting students with legal status and ripping people out of their communities without due process.” What happened to Ozturk is chilling, said America’s Voice Executive Director Vanessa Cárdenas. “Taken off the street by masked agents in unmarked cars is something we associate with authoritarian regimes, not a country that claims to uphold the rule of law, freedom, and justice. This is not how a democracy operates or what America stands for.” Read more here.
TRUMP’S DEPORTATION DRAGNET EXPANDS TO LEGAL RESIDENTS
Among the many other recent cases exposing the administration’s expanding deportation efforts, we see the targeting of hardworking immigrants, long-time residents, and students like Rumeysa Ozturk. Fabian Schmidt, a green card-holder from New Hampshire, was “violently interrogated” for hours, stripped naked, and forced into a cold shower after being detained at Boston’s Logan Airport. He’s currently in ICE detention. The family of Lewelyn Dixon, another green card-holder who has called the U.S. her home for five decades, says she was detained over a non-violent conviction from more than two decades ago for which she paid a fine and was never ordered to serve time. Dixon was detained after traveling back home to Washington state after a visit to the Philippines. Trump is also making hundreds of thousands more people deportable by moving to revoke the lawful status of beneficiaries of the “CHNV” humanitarian parole process for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans. CHNV holders could lose their protections within weeks. We’re witnessing the ruthless, random and chaotic targeting of legal residents and hard-working individuals who have done nothing more than live their lives in a nation they call home, responded Cárdenas. “As more and more stories come to light, Americans are beginning to understand the catastrophic consequences of this attack on our families and communities, and they are increasingly standing in solidarity with those who are unjustly targeted. We must ask ourselves: at what cost are we willing to let this continue?” Read more here.
TRUMP’S NATIVIST OBSESSIONS TAKE PRIORITY OVER BILLIONS IN TAX CONTRIBUTIONS, CRIME-FIGHTING
As AV has been highlighting in our “At What Cost?” campaign, all Americans will pay a high price because of Trump and Republicans’ chaotic and cruel immigration agenda and mass deportation obsessions. Two fresh reminders are evident in reports from recent days. In one development, thousands of DHS agents who “usually hunt down child abusers” and drug traffickers are now being reassigned by the Trump administration to workplace raids and unsparing arrests targeting working moms and dads. Meanwhile, the administration is also looking to weaponize the IRS to target, detain, and purge immigrant workers who contribute billions to our economy every single year (see our tax fact sheet here). The Trump team’s mass deportation obsession has no bounds, is dangerous and makes no sense, responded Vanessa Cárdenas. “They are willing to make us less safe–including our children–to go after tax-paying immigrants who pay nearly $100 billion in taxes and Social Security every year and are vital workers in key industries. They are diverting money and manpower away from federal investigations into child abuse, drug trafficking, tax fraud and money laundering and redirecting them to indiscriminate immigration arrests and even to snoop through the private tax returns of every American.” Read more here.
THE POTENTIAL IRS-ICE DEAL WILL ELIMINATE BILLIONS IN TAX REVENUE, DEVASTATE ESSENTIAL INDUSTRIES, THREATEN PRIVACY TO ALL AMERICANS
In her weekly column, America’s Voice consultant Maribel Hastings writes that the IRS-ICE plan to turn over the protected information of suspected undocumented immigrants is another sign of bad public policy and the devaluation of the billions of dollars that immigrants contribute to the nation’s coffers. “Up until now, the confidentiality of the process has been respected, precisely in the face of fear that taxpayers’ personal information, especially if they do not have documents, could be improperly used against them. Like the ex-Republican President Richard Nixon did, to persecute his political ‘enemies’ amid the Watergate scandal,” Hastings writes. She warns that such a collaboration would result in those immigrants, or even citizens married to undocumented people, just not filing their taxes at all out of fear it could get them detained or deported. She also warns it represents a “dangerous assault” on Americans’ privacy. “Today, the government can use tax information to persecute undocumented people. Tomorrow they can persecute you, even if you are a citizen, arguing other reasons. Without a doubt, a slippery and dangerous slope.” Her column was also published in several outlets, including La Opinión, El Diario NY, and La Tribuna Hispana. Read her column in English here and Spanish here.
TRUMP FINALLY ADMITS UNDOCUMENTED WORKERS ACTUALLY DO PAY TAXES
As also noted by Hastings, the administration’s mission to turn the IRS into another immigrant-hunting apparatus of the government is also a tacit admission that, contrary to the right’s years of lies, these workers actually do pay taxes. Not only do undocumented immigrants pay nearly $100 billion in taxes annually, Trump’s own undocumented workers paid more in taxes than he did. The New York Times reported in 2017 that Trump paid just $750 in federal taxes in 2017. Undocumented workers have also helped fund critical federal programs for Americans, in 2022 paying $25.7 billion into Social Security and $6.4 billion into Medicare – all programs that they’re barred from accessing unless they can adjust their legal status. The fact is that purging millions of essential workers will only hurt our economy and working families in the pocketbook. It would be so much simpler for purposes of reform and stabilizing the economy if we just allowed long-settled workers to apply for legalization. Instead, this immigrant-obsessed administration is seeking to turn the IRS into an apparatus of ICE to purge millions of workers and their contributions, human costs and economic fallout be damned. Read more here.
‘THEY ARE OUR NEIGHBORS’
Hard-working people. Loving families. Strong communities. This is who we are. But Trump’s cruel and chaotic immigration agenda is tearing families apart and going after our friends at a cost to all of us. Let’s choose community over chaos. Click here to watch and share our video and stand for our neighbors.
REMEMBERING THE ESSENTIAL WORKERS FROM THE KEY BRIDGE COLLAPSE
This week marked one year since the tragic collapse of Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge, which resulted in the deaths of six immigrant essential workers. Their names were Maynor Yassir Suazo Sandoval, Miguel Angel Luna Gonzalez, Jose Mynor Lopez, Alejandro Hernandez Fuentes, Dorlian Ronial Castillo Cabrera, and Carlos Daniel Hernández. As CASA reminded, these brave men were working in the dead of night to repair the bridge for the benefit of all drivers when a freighter horrifically pummeled into the structure. “They were fathers, sons, friends, and neighbors – human beings whose lives mattered. They were essential workers in every sense of the word.” The accident was also a reminder of the importance of immigrant workers and the vital roles they play within the construction industry (among numerous U.S. industries), which remains just as true today as it did that terrible day. Roughly 2.2 million construction workers are immigrants, representing a historic high. In the Baltimore and Washington region, immigrants make up nearly 40% of the construction workforce. In some parts of the country, entire work crews are foreign-born. Their hands quite literally build this country, and are critical in our recovery from disasters, like the devastating L.A. fires. And, as the Key bridge collapse reminded us, it’s dangerous work. “Everyone regardless of their immigration status deserves safety and security, especially when at work,” CASA continued. “No one should risk their life due to negligence. Immigrants take on the most dangerous, thankless jobs – yet their contributions are often overlooked. We must recognize their sacrifice and protect them.” Read more here.
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