Austin Immigrant Advocates Demand ICE Release Details On Planned 'Mega Raid'

AUSTIN, TX — Immigrant advocates in Austin are demanding that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials disclose details of the agency's planned "mega-raid" designed to ensnare members of undocumented communities nationwide for deportation.

On Thursday, details emerged about the agency's "Operation Mega" initiative targeting up to 10,000 undocumented immigrants nationwide. Sources suggested the operation would intentionally target anyone in the country currently undocumented.

Now, Austin immigrant advocates are calling on ICE to release documents revealing the scope of the operation. Officials at Austin-based Grassroots Leadership note the timing of the raid at a time when Donald Trump is directing the construction of more private detention facilities such as the new 1000-bed facility in Conroe, Texas. Advocates from Detention Watch Network assert this raid is a mechanism to intentionally elevate detention numbers before the new fiscal year to manufacture a need to fund more new detention beds, officials suspect.

“Trump’s plan to blatantly round up immigrants to fill detention beds ahead of the national budget debate is outrageous," Claudia Muñoz, immigration programs director at Grassroots Leadership, said. "We will continue to organize to defend local immigrant communities from this latest repulsive threat of a white supremacist ideology that dehumanizes immigrants for political gain and corporate profit.”

After reports of the planned operation leaked, ICE reportedly canceled the massive raid. But immigration advocates in Austin aren't allowing themselves to be lulled into a sense of complacency, officials suggested. That vigilance is heightened given that ICE has targeted Austin more aggressively than other cities given its expressed embrace to the immigrant population.

Unprecedented raids in Austin of a particularly aggressive nature began in Austin shortly after the election of Trump, who made the particular deportation of Mexican nationals—a group he labeled as a monolith composed of "rapists" and "criminals" —as a priority of his administration. In March, a judge in Austin revealed in open court that mass immigration raids in February were in retaliation for the stance taken by Travis County Sheriff Sally Hernandez related to honor ICE-requested "detainers" for undocumented immigrants.

Hernandez prefers a more nuanced approach to arresting members of the undocumented community and holding them for ICE, more focused on detaining felons than those without criminal records—a stance that earned the wrath of Gov. Greg Abbott, who was inspired to promote the crafting of Senate Bill 4 that punishes law enforcement officials seen as too soft on immigration enforcement among other anti-immigrant measures.

Despite the dual hurricanes of Harvey in Texas and Irma in Florida — natural disasters that will require hundreds of billions of dollars for recovery efforts —Trump continues to insist on the idea of building a wall between the U.S. and Mexico as a way of cracking down on immigration, further heightening fears of a crackdown among the undocumented.

“Since a federal judge revealed in court that ICE had been untruthful about the February raids in Austin, we know that ICE lies," said Bethany Carson, immigration researcher and organizer at Grassroots Leadership. "We are wary of reading a vague press statement as a promise that raids will not take place. We will not sit back and wait for our community to be attacked. We demand that ICE release its plan and communications about Operation Mega.”

In a previous press release yesterday, national immigration advocates called on local elected officials across the country to “take immediate steps to ensure that local and state resources are not used to help implement Operation Mega or other enforcement actions.”

Grassroots Leadership officials note there is no public policy that would prohibit ICE from commandeering Austin Police Department or other local law enforcement to assist in immigration arrests, even though Police Chief Brian Manley has stated that immigration enforcement is not a departmental policy. As a ressult, local advocates call on Austin City Council and other local officials to act swiftly to ensure our local law enforcement will never be used to assist in terrorizing immigrant communities in Austin, officials said.

“Now more than ever, officials at every level of government should cut ties with this agency that uses its power to terrorize our community and then lies to elected officials about the reason for its operation,” said Bob Libal, executive director of Grassroots Leadership.

>>> Photo of protesters decrying Senate Bill 4 at a Sept. 2 rally at the Texas Capitol by Tony Cantú