Amid growing stories that U.S. residents have been caught up within the Trump administration’s immigration dragnet, a dozen members of Congress have written to the federal government with pointed questions. None has obtained a reply.
Only a week into President Donald Trump’s second time period, Rep. Adriano Espaillat started to see stories of Puerto Ricans and others being questioned and arrested by immigration brokers.
So Espaillat, a New York Democrat, did what members of Congress usually do: He wrote to the administration and demanded solutions. That was greater than 10 weeks in the past. Espaillat has not obtained a response.
His expertise seems to be widespread.
At the very least a dozen members of Congress, all Democrats, have written to the Trump administration with pointed questions on constituents and different residents whom immigration brokers have questioned, detained and even held at gunpoint. In a single letter, Democrats on the Home Judiciary Committee demanded an inventory of each citizen detained throughout the brand new administration.
None has obtained a solution.
“What we are clearly seeing is that with this administration, they are not responding to congressional inquiries,” stated Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández, a New Mexico Democrat.
Leger Fernández and others wrote to Trump and the Division of Homeland Safety on Jan. 28 after receiving complaints from constituents and tribal nations that federal brokers have been urgent tribal residents in New Mexico for his or her immigration standing, elevating considerations about racial profiling.
The congresswoman and others say the shortage of response is a part of a broader sample during which the administration has been shifting to sideline Congress and its constitutional energy to examine the chief department.
“That is a big concern on a level beyond what ICE is doing,” Leger Fernández stated, referring to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a department of DHS. “This administration does not seem to recognize the power and authority and responsibility” of Congress.
Associated | Trump is chomping on the bit to ship US residents to Salvadoran jail
Norman Ornstein, a longtime congressional observer on the American Enterprise Institute, stated prior administrations’ lack of responsiveness has annoyed lawmakers too. However he’s by no means seen one so completely brush off Congress.
“What’s clear now is that the message from Donald Trump and his minions is: ‘You don’t have to respond to these people, whether they are ours or not,’” Ornstein stated, referring to Republicans and Democrats. “That’s not usual. Nothing about this is usual.”
A White Home spokesperson denied that the administration has been circumventing Congress or its oversight. “Passage of the continuing resolution that kept our government open and commonsense legislation like the Laken Riley Act are indicative of how closely the Trump administration is working with Congress,” stated Kush Desai in a press release.
The White Home didn’t reply questions in regards to the letters. DHS additionally didn’t reply to ProPublica’s questions.
Final month, ProPublica detailed how People have been caught within the administration’s dragnet. Such errors have been made by many administrations over many years. The federal government usually has not taken steps to cut back errors, corresponding to updating its information when brokers affirm someone’s citizenship. However consultants and advocates have warned that Trump’s aggressive immigration objectives — together with arrest quotas for enforcement brokers — make it extra seemingly that residents will get caught up.
ICE and its sister company, Customs and Border Safety, stated in earlier statements to ProPublica that brokers are allowed to ask for residents’ identification. The businesses didn’t present explanations for his or her actions in a lot of the instances ProPublica requested about.
Solutions have been additionally onerous to return by throughout Trump’s first time period, even when Democrats managed the Home and had extra energy over hearings.
At a Home listening to in 2019 about household separation, lawmakers pressed then-Border Patrol Chief Brian Hastings about one other concern: the three-week detention of a Dallas-born highschool scholar and citizen, who was solely launched after The Dallas Morning Information reported what occurred.
Hastings stated the coed by no means claimed to be a citizen throughout his detention — although the newspaper reported that the company’s personal paperwork famous the other. Hastings additionally declined to provide any broader accounting of how usually the company had held People. “I don’t have information about specific cases,” he stated. (Hastings didn’t reply to requests for remark.)
Espaillat, the New York consultant, has been in workplace for eight years. He stated he regularly raised immigration questions and considerations through the Biden administration too, and bought responses.
Republicans complained in regards to the reverse expertise through the Biden administration. They stated the administration was unresponsive to Congress’ questions on immigration, forcing lawmakers to subpoena officers for solutions. (The administration dismissed the strikes as “political posturing.”)
Espaillat stated he’s not stunned the Trump administration has been silent. “They probably don’t have a good answer.”
