No Better Time than Now to Abolish ICE and Defund Local Police
Zaineb-Stalene, Undergraduate Student (UM-Dearborn) The smallest traffic ticket has led to the inhumane deportations of thousands of immigrants in the US. ICE has time and time again scanned the database of many local police officers accounts to pick out any innocent person to deport. The real basis behind ICE is racism and it’s a reflection of our government. There is no better time to finally abolish ICE and defund our local police officers. ICE has single handedly ruined the lives of millions of innocent people with the help of our government. The US government has passed countless policies to only insure ICE of their job and protect them. History has shown politicians that promised to make immigration more humane in fact did not help with and only made it worse. With the help of the government, migrants are being torn from their homes because of things as simple as traffic tickets. For example in January, President Biden’s Secretary of Homeland Security opposed defunding ICE, and said he needed to study if it was “efficient and effective.” The administration that promised to “reform immigration policies” has clearly shown their support for the unjust acts of ICE. Our government has failed us. Our country is no longer the country of opportunities or “land of the free” it is a country that picks and chooses which race or ethnicity they want in their country. In the 1930s and 40s, for example, the Border Patrol sent “Special Mexican Deportation Parties” to cities throughout the United States. This was a clear agenda against Mexicans. Today, we find that Mexican and other Latin American immigrant communities are subject to frequent ICE raids, often with the support of local police. “We don’t arrest many German people,” an ICE official says on Immigration Nation, a Netflix documentary released last year. This government agency is outwardly racist and it is only a reflection of the systematic racism in the government. The US government has shown no favor to those migrants that are minorities. “White” German immigrants, like other European immigrants, rarely get deported even though they, too, may wind up in the U.S. without authorization or violate the terms of their visas. To defund the local police would be a big step in the abolishment of ICE. This agency relies on the support of our local police officers. While George Bush was in office ICE launched Secure Communities, this was a program that lets immigration authorities scour police databases searching for people who might be deportable, including those who’ve committed minor traffic violations. Defunding police would mean limiting their reach. This agency does not only arrest those individuals with the traffic ticket, but also supports ICE raids and investigations. The counterargument that many people may have would be that these immigrants are causing crime and drug dealing is big in those communities. Something people that make those claims don't understand is that that is immigrants, in general, exhibit lower crime rates than native-born Americans. To remove the support of local police officers by defunding them would be a significant blow to ICE. Beyond this, ICE should be defunded and, subsequently, abolished. ICE is costly, ineffective, and harmful. Money and other resources should be spent on making the green card process free and creating attainable pathways to citizenships. Abolish ICE. Defund our local Police.
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