Congress Has Ten Days to Stop Funding ICE’s Unchecked Abuse

Our country is grieving the people Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection have killed, detained, or disappeared from their loved ones. Just days ago — before immigration agents shot and killed intensive care unit nurse Alex Peretti — federal leaders were preparing to approve even more money for these agencies. It seemed that they were going to proceed with business as usual.

But then people across the country, from all walks of life, called on Congress to stop the Department of Homeland Security’s annual funding legislation. So, last week, Congress rejected the bill. Yesterday, it fully funded the rest of the government and only gave DHS a short-term extension. On February 13, its annual funding will run out.

We must tell Congress that it has no more excuses. The nation is watching. Will members of Congress take the necessary steps to stop the violence and hold ICE and CBP accountable for their lawlessness?

Why This is the Moment to Ensure that Congress Holds DHS Accountable

Usually, Congress only gets one chance each year to decide how much money DHS and other federal agencies receive and how they should spend our money. That’s why this moment is so important: Congress must use its current leverage to ensure our tax dollars are not used to threaten protesters, put children in detention, or tear families apart.

Last summer, Congress loaded ICE and CBP up with more funding than most of the world’s militaries and Senator Rand Paul recently reminded his colleagues that even without this funding bill, “ICE will still have about 87% more funding than last year.” Adding even more funds and doing nothing on accountability is unconscionable.

How Congress Can Stop the Violence

Poll after poll shows that people across the country are frustrated with DHS and its actions. Yet some lawmakers are still offering limited solutions, like expanding programs for body-worn cameras. While these may assist in investigating abuses, the reality is that these programs already exist and have not stopped abusive behavior. The Trump administration repeatedly tells immigration agents to ignore the law and standard procedures. More body cameras or additional training as a guardrail simply falls short of the calls for change, transparency, and accountability. We demand action that will stop the violence.

NILC President Kica Matos sent a letter to Congress outlining the concrete steps needed for accountability and change:

• Don’t provide a single dollar for ICE or CBP until they leave our communities.
• Revoke the $170 billion in immigration enforcement and detention slush funds.
• Fully cooperate with state and local investigations into violence, murder, and misconduct.
• End qualified immunity so agents can be held responsible for misconduct.
• Stop allowing ICE and CBP agents in sensitive locations, like schools, churches, hospitals, and polling places.
• Require agents to get a judicial warrant before making an arrest.
• Stop allowing ICE to jail families, including babies and toddlers, and stop allowing ICE and CBP to disappear parents from their families.
• Prohibit agents from hiding their identities while on the job.

Congress Has Ten Days —That’s Plenty of Time on the Legislative Clock

Advocates and community members have been calling on policymakers to pass these measures for years. Many of the policies that would provide true change have been introduced as legislation but not acted upon before. If Congress cannot enact them in the next ten days, it should refuse to approve any new money for DHS until these reforms are in place.

Undoubtedly, ICE and CBP will use these ten days to continue their cruel treatment of immigrants and their communities with ever more families torn apart and more communities under siege. That’s why we must keep urging Congress to fight against DHS’s authoritarian actions up to and beyond this funding deadline.

Every person dragged out of their home and deported without due process is another reason for Congress to act.

Every peaceful protestor followed by DHS agents to their home and threatened is another reason for Congress to act.

Every journalist arrested for covering a protest is another reason for Congress to act.

Every dollar used by this government to try and rid the country of immigrants is another reason for Congress to act.

And it’s up to us to make sure Congress acts. Call on Congress and tell them: we must see budget cuts and we must see dramatic, permanent change that meets the moment. Now.