Federal Judge Confirms Heightened Austin ICE Action Is Payback For Softened Immigration Policy

AUSTIN, TX — The recent sweeps for undocumented immigrants in Austin by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were done in retaliation for the new sheriff's policy ending a close partnership with the federal agency over a preference in focusing on high-level felons for deportation, according to a published report.

As first reported by the Austin American-Statesman Monday, federal agents privately alerted two magistrate judges in late January they would target Austin with heightened a heightened immigration crackdown.

The reason: A more nuanced policy by Travis County Sheriff Sally Hernandez that doesn't cooperate with ICE in honoring so-called "detainers," 48-hour holds placed on any arrested person suspected of being undocumented to allow an agent plenty of time to arrive (usually from San Antonio) to fetch the detained person and follow up on deportation.

The Statesman reported the acknowledgment that the unprecedented sweeps for the undocumented that began the first week of February were made in open court by U.S. Magistrate Judge Andrew Austin on Monday. Austin also serves as an adjunct professor at the University of Texas.

“We had a briefing … that we could expect a big operation, agents coming in from out of town, that it was going to be a specific operation, and at least it was related to us in that meeting that it was the result of the sheriff’s new policy that this was going to happen,” Austin said, as quoted by the Statesman.

That closeness was illustrated in an October 2014 Austin Chronicle article showcasing internal emails between Hamilton and ICE, federal agents often handing the former sheriff talking points directly from their headquarters in handling questions about his immigration-related policies to local media outlets ("Sheriff and ICE eager pen pals, Oct. 10, 2014.")

Flash forward to 2017, with Hernandez as the new sheriff in town after Hamilton decided not to run again. Hernandez handily won the election for sheriff with roughly 60 percent of the vote, interpreted as a mandate approving of her more nuanced approach to local immigration policy that focused on felons for deportation rather than also including those with mere misdemeanors on their records.

The upshot: Hernandez's November election spelled the abrupt end to the cozy relationship ICE had so long enjoyed in the Hamilton era.

What followed less than three months later was unprecedented in Austin, with people being pulled over on roadways or visited at homes and workplaces as ICE agents descended on Austin to root out undocumented immigrants beginning in early February. ICE agents' efforts undoubtedly were fueled by Hernandez's more softened approach but buoyed by Donald Trump and Greg Abbott, both eager proponents of wholesale deportations from their presidential and governor's perches, respectively.

Immediately, suspicions emerged that the crackdown never before seen (the undocumented before detected largely during times of arrest, not personal visits by ICE agents) was sort of payback against Hernandez. The revelation made in court on Monday seems to support those suspicions.

“Today’s news confirms our worst fears and calls into question the legitimacy of recent enforcement actions,” Workers Defense Project Executive Director Jose P. Garza said in a statement on Monday. “Many law abiding Austin families were, in fact, politically targeted in those ICE raids by the Trump administration, and the Department of Homeland Security must immediately provide our community with answers.”

Suspicions of ICE payback for the county's post-Hamilton immigration policies emerged in earnest last month when WDP joined the Texas Civil Rights Project and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund in filing a Freedom of Information Act request with DHS to determine if the recent immigration crackdown was in retaliation against Hernandez.

As it happens, the revelation by the judge confirming that payback comes two days before the deadline for the DHS to response to that information request.

Bob Libal, executive director of Grassroots Leadership in Austin, reacted angrily to the revelations, calling out past missives by ICE positing enforcement action as routine to have been outright lies.

“This revelation in open court proves what immigrants and advocates have known for years — that ICE regularly lies to immigrants, local officials, and the media,” Libal said. “Now more than ever, officials at every level of government should rethink their relationship with this agency, and cut ties with an entity that used its power to terrorize our community and then lies to elected officials about the reason for its operation.”

The revelation by the judge contradicts ICE's insistence that the recent crackdowns were done as part of its routine operations, as officials insisted in press releases sent to media representatives. Reached by the Statesman Monday evening to explain the discrepancy, the agency declined to provide specifics on the report while advancing their earlier position now largely disproved by the judge's comments.

“For operational security reasons, ICE does not discuss future operations," an ICE prepared statement read. "However, ICE conducts daily operations nationwide targeting and arresting criminal aliens and other individuals who are in violation of our nation’s immigration laws for the safety and security of our communities.”

For her part, Hernandez declined to comment through her spokeswoman Kristen Dark, given that she wasn't in the loop by ICE agents as to their plans to crack down on immigrants as they alerted the municipal judges.

This wouldn't be the first time Hernandez's stance has earned the ire — and measurable measures of retaliation — by critics in the highest echelons of power. Abbott — himself married to a granddaughter of Mexican immigrants — recently rescinded $1.5 million in grants on which the county counts on annually to conduct various Travis County community programs unrelated to law enforcement to voice his own displeasure at Hernandez's stance.

The governor also has made the elimination of what he views as "sanctuary cities" not aggressively helping deport undocumented immigrants as an "emergency item" of his administration.

Related story: Travis County Accounts For 70 Percent Of DHS List Of Rejected ICE Detainers

Photo of last month's "No Ban, No Wall" rally at the state Capitol in the wake of heightened ICE raids by Tony Cantú