There were 61 criminal justice bills and issues being heard before the Joint Committee on the Judiciary at the Massachusetts State House on October 8, and those of us from New Bedford were there to offer testimony regarding two.
House Bill 1368, an act relative to enforcing federal law sponsored by State Representative Antonio Cabral, would prohibit county sheriffs and the Department of Corrections from using state or local funds for federal immigration activities carried out under 287(g) agreements with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
For those not familiar with them, 287(g) agreements deputize state and county personnel as federal immigration agents at the state’s expense, and are an extreme form of collaboration with ICE involving minimally trained personnel going through local jails to identify people they believe are subject to removal, and placing them in ICE custody for eventual deportation.
The government uses state and local taxpayer dollars to identify people for deportation, but state and county personnel receive no compensation from the federal government for these services, and taxpayers get no accounting of how the money is spent.
As it is, Massachusetts ranks forty-fifth when it comes to the amount of federal money it gets in contrast to how much federal tax it pays, so why should more money be paid to the federal government for working for it?
Since ICE already is present in our jails and prisons, the federal government should use its own personnel to carry out its responsibilities for immigration enforcement.
In Massachusetts county sheriffs often serve as jailors for small police departments, so these contracts can damage the relationship between immigrant communities and local law enforcement upon which they rely for protection. When someone is transferred to ICE custody and deported instead of being released on bail, defendants and victims are deprived of their day in court, and the community loses confidence in the police/criminal justice system.
People detained in 287(g) jurisdictions don’t know whether they are being questioned by a law enforcement officer or by an immigration officer, and may unwittingly jeopardize their own immigration cases. There is no requirement to inform detainees that the deputy sheriff interviewing them is also an immigration officer.
Federal law currently prohibits the federal government from paying for these activities, and H1368 would effectively end 287(g) programs in Massachusetts unless and until the federal government decides to invest its own dollars in such programs.
State dollars should not be used for federal immigration enforcement.
The other bill was House Bill 1369, An Act limiting the use of prison labor, that would require that any inmate work program in the Commonwealth be performed within the boundaries of the state prohibiting Massachusetts participation in any so-called national inmate work program like that used to build a wall along the southern border of the United States using individual state’s prison labor. This bill is in response to Bristol County Massachusetts sheriff Thomas Hodgson pledging in 2017 that he would volunteer county inmates to help build the wall on the Southern border, his first step of many to catch Trump’s attention.
The Sheriff did not outline details for his planned program’s funding for the transportation, housing, security, and insurance costs that this would involve.
The bill would ensure that the positive returns from rehabilitation and skills training programs benefit local communities.
Not only did I and the other New Bedford person point out that the sheriff’s justification for his agreement with ICE was devoid of facts, relying on the appeal to fear based stereotypes of the “Other”, and presented facts to oppose the ICE agreement, but others testifying in favor of these bills did as well.
When the sheriff’s turn came, he stepped forward to testify against the bills, but he falteringly spoke about an unrelated bill dealing with the need for parity between the pay of county corrections officers and those of the state, a bill that had been dealt with earlier in the day and for which he had not signed up to address, repeating many of the points made earlier by others dealing with that bill at the time it as dealt with. The uncertainty in his delivery was in such contrast to his usual bravado and bluster that people got the impression that he had prepared a rebuttal of House Bills 1368 and 1369 according to his traditional presentation of the need for ICE agreements in broad unsubstantiated terms, but realized this would not be the best approach as those testifying before him had pointed out his usual lack of facts in contrast to the facts, figures, statistics, and studies presented by those who oppose ICE agreements.
Within 30 minutes of the testimony regarding these bills ending, the sheriff tweeted, “Pro-illegal immigration activists paraded up before me bashing myself and my office for our cooperation partnerships with @ICE.gov.”
Interestingly, rather than refuting the claims made by those he says “paraded up before me bashing myself “, he supported them as he claims he was bashed without citing anything that would show that to be true. He did as they claimed he does when justifying his negative attitude toward immigrants and his support of ICE. He made a statement as if just saying it makes it true.
My testimony, delivered both orally and in writing was:
“I am here in support of H1368, An Act relative to enforcing federal law.
Massachusetts General laws Part 1:Title XV: Section 102 states that “All persons within the commonwealth, regardless of sex, race, color, creed, or national origin, shall have the full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of persons and property.”
There are no qualifiers, and in spite of people who might say this law only applied to legal citizens, there is nothing in the wording that says that. It says “All persons”.
But there are some who, for the sake of their own political agenda and aspirations, seek to ignore the law and ignore people’s rights.
As a Gay man who has lived in the Buckle of the Bible Belt, I am all too familiar with the use of a group of people to promote personal and political agendas by pushing an image of them based on misinformation while ignoring facts and reality to promote fear of them to justify actions against them.
According to the Bristol County sheriff’s broad and unsupported opinion, undocumented people make communities less safe by allowing a person who commits a crime to avoid arrest and roam the streets with immunity to the law, and to have us believe what he and ICE are doing protects us from what in reality is just not there.
The sheriff does not present any facts or studies when he makes his assertions, claiming instead it is common sense. Law enforcement action should be based on facts as opposed common sense as common sense is relative while facts are not.
Social-science research consistently shows that undocumented immigrants are considerably less likely to commit crime than native-born people. If you are here and face possible deportation if discovered, it is obvious that it is to your advantage to keep out of the spotlight.
The Cato Institute has found that native-born residents are much more likely to be convicted of crime than immigrants legal or undocumented.
The journal Criminology found places with higher percentages of undocumented immigrants do not have higher rates of crime, but, rather, states with larger shares of undocumented immigrants tend to have lower crime rates than states with less, and, therefore, not only does illegal immigration not increase crime, it may actually contribute to the drop in overall crime.
And while claiming the active presence of ICE reduces danger he does not present any before and after statistics that would validate that claim.
Having the word POLICE on their uniforms gives onlookers the impression that ICE’s actions are those of the local police. It is ICE who endangers the community by creating an adversarial relationship between the community and the local police.
This does not keep anyone safe.
Nor does representing one group in the community as a threat to others with no facts to back that, but, rather, relying on negative stereotypes and baseless claims.
The taxpayers of the state should not be paying for anyone’s political agenda and self-promotion.”