This video from the USA says about itself:
15 February 2017
Protests erupt in Tacoma, Washington after ICE arrests immigrant ‘dreamer’ near the state’s capital.
SEATTLE – A man who was brought to the U.S. illegally as a child but was protected from deportation by the Obama administration has been taken into custody in the Seattle area in what could be the first case of its kind in the country.
Daniel Ramirez Medina, 23, was arrested last Friday by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.
Civil rights attorneys have now filed a federal lawsuit, challenging what they call the “unconstitutional detention” of Ramirez Medina.
According to court documents, ICE agents went to a Seattle area home to arrest his father. The younger Ramirez Medina was also at the home.
His attorneys say that ICE agents asked their client whether he was in the U.S. legally. He told them “Yes, I have a work permit.”
Court documents say the ICE agents responded by saying, “It doesn’t matter because you weren’t born in this country.”
Ramirez Medina has a work permit under Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA).
The program provides a reprieve from deportation as well as renewable work permits to eligible immigrant youth who came to the United States illegally when they were just children. Roughly 750,000 young people, often referred to as “Dreamers,” are DACA recipients.
Court documents say the application process to become a DACA recipient includes a thorough background check in which the Department of Homeland Security must make sure the applicant has no serious criminal history and does not pose a threat to public safety.
Ramirez Medina’s attorneys say he went through that strict screening on more than one occasion over the years.
“Our country made a promise to these young people that by coming forward and following the rules, those who have grown up with America as their home would not be deported to a country that is unfamiliar to them,” said Luis Cortes, who is one of the attorneys representing Ramirez Medina. “The administration has indicated its willingness to find solutions that don’t renege on that promise. It’s important to remember that the legal status of DACA recipients hasn’t changed.”
But attorneys say ICE agents completely ignored Ramirez Medina’s DACA status when took him into custody. He’s being held at the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma, awaiting removal proceedings before an immigration judge.
Protestors gathered outside the detention center Tuesday evening, demanding Ramirez Medina be released.
“He told them he was a DACA recipient and they said it doesn’t matter,” said Rolando Avila, who helped organize the protest. “They said we’re going to take you anyway. So we’re here in solidarity, and we demand he be released, because he is someone that is valuable in this community. We are seeing this across the country, attacks on immigrants, and we don’t want to stand idle.”
An attorney with the Northwest Immigrant Rights Projects, one of many co-counsels on Ramirez Medina’s case, told KING 5 he hopes it was all a big misunderstanding and that the young man was taken into custody by mistake.
By Zaida Green in the USA:
First ICE raids under Trump arrest nearly 700 immigrants in five days
16 February 2017
Over 680 people were arrested in a five-day-long campaign of raids by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency last week, according to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). A quarter of those arrested had no criminal records.
The first immigration sweep by the Trump administration also marks the first arrest of a DACA recipient, 23-year-old Daniel Ramirez Medina.
Ramirez, who arrived in the United States at the age of seven, was granted a temporary stay of leave and a work permit under the Obama administration’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. Ramirez was arrested at his father’s house in Seattle, Washington on the morning of February 10, in a raid targeting his father.
ICE is seeking to deport Ramirez in spite of his DACA status, which he renewed last year. Ramirez has no criminal record. ICE claims that Ramirez has admitted to being a gang member, but his attorneys assert that the agents “repeatedly pressured [him] to falsely admit affiliation.”
“The agents who arrested and questioned Mr. Ramirez were aware that he was a DACA recipient, yet they informed him that he would be arrested, detained, and deported anyway, because he was not ‘born in this country,’” according to the complaint filed by his attorneys.
Ramirez is being held in an ICE detention center in Tacoma, Washington ahead of deportation proceedings before an immigration judge. His attorneys are arguing that his detention is unconstitutional, and are seeking an injunction against further arrests. Federal magistrate judge James Donohue has ordered DHS to justify Ramirez’s detention by today.
More than two dozen demonstrators gathered outside the Northwest Detention Center on Tuesday to protest Ramirez’s detention. “All his life is here, he has his family here, he has his dreams here,” Wendy Pantoja, one of the protesters, told the News Tribune. “But now he’s here,” she said motioning toward the detention center. In the past few days, tens of thousands of workers and young people have rallied in the defense of immigrant rights and in opposition to the recent ICE raids.
Ramirez is one of 750,000 young “DREAMers” who were brought to the United States as children and granted a two-year, renewable reprieve from deportation under the DACA program. The Trump administration is now in possession of the fingerprints and addresses of all 750,000 DREAMers. Up to 8 million people are potential targets for deportation under Trump’s January executive orders, including immigrants only accused of committing a crime.
“The crackdown on illegal criminals is merely the keeping of my campaign promise,” Trump tweeted Sunday morning. “Gang members, drug dealers & others are being removed!”
A majority of last week’s raids were conducted near or around homes, in the early hours of the morning. Immigrant advocacy groups report ICE agents posing as other branches of law enforcement and arresting immigrants heading out to work.
Multimillionaire fast-food boss Andrew Puzder withdrew his nomination to head the Department of Labor Wednesday, in another sign of the deepening political crisis of the Trump administration. He is the first one of Trump’s 16 cabinet picks to fail to win confirmation: here.
A growing number of activists are calling for a general national strike against President Drumpf on February 17, 2017: here.
Dear Kitty. Some blog 
Last week, Ervin Gonzalez, an undocumented El Paso woman and domestic abuse survivor, was ambushed and arrested inside a courthouse just as the judge was granting her a protective order from her abuser.1
It gets worse: her attorneys believe that it was her abuser who tipped federal immigration agents about her undocumented status. This likely violates provisions in the Violence Against Women Act.2
This is horrifying and should not have happened. Undocumented survivors already avoid reporting their abusers for fear of deportation or being separated from their children.
This is not who we are. It’s up to us to stand together to protect each other.
The good news is that this story has gotten widespread attention overnight. Immigration officials have discretionary authority–that means they can choose to release Gonzalez and stop targeting immigrant survivors. If thousands of us generate enough outrage while this story is still in the headlines, immigration officials will be pressured to release Gonzalez and stop targeting survivors of violence for deportation.
Tell U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Thomas Homan: Release Ervin Gonzalez. Stop targeting survivors of domestic abuse!
Sign the petition
Donald Trump is making good on his promise to deport immigrants and tear up families. Just last week, hundreds of immigrants across six states were ambushed in their homes and at work to be deported.3
Even El Paso officials were alarmed that immigration agents picked up Gonzalez–El Paso County Judge Veronica Escobar said the “fact that this occurred in a protective-order court is shocking.”4
But Gonzalez and immigrant survivors are supposed to be protected by the federal Violence Against Women Act, which protects immigrant survivors from detention and deportation. Certain provisions protect immigrant survivors from being reported by their abuser and from being detained in a courthouse when reporting their abuse. And as a transgender woman, Gonzalez faces an especially horrific time into detention–transgender women are either kept in solitary confinement or are forced in detention with men, making them a target for sexual assault.5
Yesterday, the public successfully took out one of Trump’s cabinet picks for domestic abuse charges.6 Right now, the administration doesn’t want to be seen as a predator to women and survivors. If enough of us speak out against Trump’s deportation machine for targeting abused women, we can force Gonzalez’s release and stop immigration officials from targeting survivors.
Will you sign the petition to the Director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement now?
https://act.weareultraviolet.org/sign/el-paso-ice/?t=1&akid=4134.1176117.J60kiK
–Nita, Shaunna, Kat, Karin, Adam, Holly, Kathy, Onyi, Susan, Anathea, Audine, Shannon, Megan, Libby, Emma, PaKou, and Pilar, the UltraViolet team
Sources:
1. ICE detains alleged domestic violence victim, El Paso Times, February 15, 2017
2. Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) Confidentiality Provisions at DHS, Department of Homeland Security, accessed February 16, 2017
3. Federal agents conduct immigration enforcement raids in at least six states, Washington Post, February 11, 2017
4. Report: ICE detains domestic violence victim in court, The Hill, February 15, 2016
5. Transgender Women Fear Abuse in Immigration Detention, New York Times, January 10, 2017
6. Andrew Puzder withdraws as a labor secretary nominee, CNN, February 15, 2017
LikeLike
LikeLike
LikeLike
Pingback: Stand Up to Trump Britain update | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: Trump wants more deportations from the USA | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant policies | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: Trump deports Somali war refugees in torture flight | Dear Kitty. Some blog