These are some of our local tales of “expedited removal,” ICE-y renditions that chill the soul.
Alan Junior Pierre: Pierre is a 20-year-old Haitian national, a high school student in Spring Valley, NY. He fled the gang violence in Haiti to join his father, a U.S. citizen living in NY, and was given permission to enter in January on special humanitarian parole status.
He was arrested by ICE on June 3rd when he went in for a routine fingerprinting appointment, declared “illegal” under Trump’s new policy, and shipped to the Delaney Hall Detention Facility in Newark, NJ. A notorious facility that was described by Senator Cory Booker at the time as a “house of horrors.”
While there, DHS tried to get him to sign papers to voluntarily self-deport, but he refused. After intervention by Mike Lawler and Chuck Schumer, Pierre was released on July 9, his future uncertain as immigration proceedings continue. His father said “psychologically, he’s damaged. You can tell.”
Per Lawler’s brand, he issued a self-promoting press release “celebrating” Pierre’s release, and criticizing Schumer’s response.
Yeonsoo Go: Go is a 20-year-old South Korean national, a college student at Purdue. She moved to NY in 2021 with her mother, who is an Episcopal priest, and had an R-2 visa as a religious worker’s dependent. ICE arrested her on July 31 when she attended a routine immigration court appearance, claiming her visa had expired. She was flown to Louisiana 2 days later for detention. The story got national attention.
Once again, it took intervention by a number of politicians and community members to obtain her release on August 4th, starting with NY State Assemblywoman Amy Paulin. Compare Paulin’s reaction above, and her description on scarsdale10583.com of the “bipartisan effort” to free Go, with another self-congratulatory press release from Lawler, and this post:
Again, no criticism of ICE from Lawler. Just claiming full credit for the release and the need to “fix our broken immigration system.”
Amy Lituma: Lituma is a 25-year-old Ecuadorian who entered the U.S. with her 8-month-old son in 2021. She did not apply for asylum, and has been living in Peekskill, NY working as a housekeeper. On July 29, ICE stopped her at a BJ’s wholesale store, asking questions about her partner, then followed her home and arrested her in front of her now 4-year-old child.
She was given the choice of either self-deporting with her child, or being separated from her child and detained. DSS said:
ICE does not separate families. Parents are asked if they want to be removed with their children, or ICE will place the children with a safe person the parent designates.
She returned to Ecuador with her son earlier this week.
As we know, this is happening across the country. After an ICE raid at a Home Depot parking lot in Washington, D.C. this week, where a number of day laborers were reportedly arrested, a witness said:
“It was cool when Trump was saying it, but to actually see it first hand? I didn’t like it,” Brooks said. The day laborers “are not bad people”, and he wondered what happened to the children of the men that were taken away. – The Guardian
These are not the “worst of the worst,” as Trump promised. As of July 27, ICE is holding 56,945 immigrants in detention. 71.1% of them have no criminal conviction. And many of those convicted were only for minor offenses, including traffic violations.
What does Mike Lawler have to say about all of this? He emphasizes that Biden created the problem. “I think the Trump administration obviously is trying to fix a lot of the problems here,” Lawler said. “And so, in order to do that, you’re going to have changes in the way that this system is employed.”
Mike seems to be OK with how ICE is rolling, voting in favor of increasing their annual budget from $8.7B to $27.7B, a larger budget than most of the world’s militaries.
This week. Lawler introduced a bipartisan bill to keep homeless people and their pets together, the PUPP Act. How about peaceful, tax-paying, law-abiding immigrants and their children, Mike?
If only there was an expedited removal process for Congressmen who abdicate legal and moral responsibility.
Alan Junior Pierre photo credit: Seth Harrison/The Journal News
Rule of Lawler 