US congressional legislators condemn Trump’s attacks on Caribbean immigrants

The Chairs of the Con­gres­sion­al Tri-Cau­cus have de­nounced Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump’s at­tacks on Caribbean and oth­er im­mi­grants as protests con­tin­ue in Los An­ge­les over his im­mi­gra­tion poli­cies.

Con­gres­sion­al Black Cau­cus (CBC) Chair, Yvette D. Clarke, Con­gres­sion­al His­pan­ic Cau­cus Chair, Adri­ano Es­pail­lat and Con­gres­sion­al Asian Pa­cif­ic Amer­i­can Cau­cus Chair, Grace Meng, told a news con­fer­ence that Trump’s ac­tions are tar­get­ing im­mi­grant com­mu­ni­ties in Los An­ge­les and across the coun­try.

“Pres­i­dent Trump’s un­law­ful de­ci­sion to de­ploy the Na­tion­al Guard on­to the streets of Los An­ge­les is a reck­less and in­flam­ma­to­ry es­ca­la­tion, one de­signed not to re­store calm, but to pro­voke chaos,” said Clarke, the daugh­ter of Ja­maican im­mi­grants, who rep­re­sents the 9th Con­gres­sion­al Dis­trict in Brook­lyn, New York.

She added: “Pres­i­dent Trump is pos­tur­ing as a strong­man, des­per­ate, dan­ger­ous, and ut­ter­ly de­tached from the prin­ci­ples of democ­ra­cy. This is not about pro­tect­ing pub­lic safe­ty. It’s about stok­ing fear and si­lenc­ing peace­ful dis­sent.”

Con­gress­woman Clarke said that this is a di­rect at­tack on civ­il rights, due process and de­mo­c­ra­t­ic norms, tar­get­ing Black and com­mu­ni­ties of colour.

“Con­gres­sion­al De­moc­rats stand in full sol­i­dar­i­ty with the res­i­dents of Los An­ge­les, with our im­mi­grant broth­ers and sis­ters, and with the peace­ful pro­test­ers who dare to speak out—and we will sup­port every ef­fort to op­pose this pres­i­dent’s abuse of pow­er,” Con­gress­woman Clarke added.

Es­pail­lat, a na­tive of the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic, who rep­re­sents New York’s 13th Con­gres­sion­al Dis­trict, in­clud­ing Harlem, said peo­ple that are try­ing to com­ply with the law, with the pa­ra­me­ters that have been set for them, with the reg­u­la­tions that have been set for them to fol­low and are be­ing trapped in the court­rooms, in Im­mi­gra­tion and Cus­toms En­force­ment (ICE) of­fices as they try to com­ply with the rules and reg­u­la­tions.

“That is the state of Amer­i­ca to­day. That’s why peo­ple took to the street to protest, and that’s why mem­bers of Con­gress went to these ICE fa­cil­i­ties, to com­ply with our du­ties of over­sight grant­ed to us by the Unit­ed States Con­sti­tu­tion.”

“And we were sum­mar­i­ly de­nied en­try. We will be go­ing back, and we will con­tin­ue to go back un­til we have ac­cess to those fa­cil­i­ties and we de­ter­mine ex­act­ly what’s go­ing on there,” said Meng, who rep­re­sents the 6th Con­gres­sion­al Dis­trict in Queens.

“Like mil­lions of Amer­i­cans across the coun­try, I am deeply con­cerned by the ad­min­is­tra­tion’s use of ag­gres­sive tac­tics against im­mi­grant com­mu­ni­ties,” she said.

“Armed agents have raid­ed schools, work­places and homes, ter­ror­iz­ing our neigh­bours and rip­ping fam­i­lies apart.This is not about pub­lic safe­ty, this is about ex­ert­ing con­trol and strik­ing fear in im­mi­grant com­mu­ni­ties.”

“As Mem­bers of Con­gress, we will con­tin­ue to ex­er­cise our le­gal au­thor­i­ty to con­duct over­sight of de­ten­tion cen­tres and de­mand ac­count­abil­i­ty from the ad­min­is­tra­tion, and we will fight for im­mi­gra­tion poli­cies that re­flect our na­tion’s val­ues of fair­ness and dig­ni­ty for all—not cru­el­ty dis­guised as law and or­der,” Meng said.

In re­sponse to protests in Los An­ge­les over raids tar­get­ing mi­grant work­ers, Trump mo­bilised up to 4,000 Na­tion­al Guard ser­vice mem­bers in Cal­i­for­nia, de­spite Gov­er­nor Gavin New­som’s ob­jec­tions.

Trump’s or­der is the first time since 1965 that a US Pres­i­dent has de­ployed a state’s Na­tion­al Guard with­out a re­quest from the state’s gov­er­nor.

Trump has al­so ac­ti­vat­ed 700 Marines to join the Na­tion­al Guard troops in their mis­sion, es­ca­lat­ing a mil­i­tary pres­ence that lo­cal of­fi­cials deem un­nec­es­sary.

The Los An­ge­les Po­lice De­part­ment Chief Jim Mc­Don­nell said that the ar­rival of fed­er­al mil­i­tary forces presents a “sig­nif­i­cant lo­gis­ti­cal and op­er­a­tional chal­lenge” for of­fi­cers charged with safe­guard­ing the city.

US House De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Leader Ha­keem Jef­fries said the vi­o­lent as­sault and ar­rest of Cal­i­for­nia union Pres­i­dent David Huer­ta is un­ac­cept­able, call­ing for the charges to be dropped.

New York City Coun­cil Mem­ber Mer­cedes Nar­cisse, the Hait­ian-born rep­re­sen­ta­tive for the 46th Coun­cil Dis­trict in Brook­lyn, said she stands “in sol­i­dar­i­ty with Huer­ta and the count­less work­ers and ad­vo­cates fight­ing for jus­tice and fair­ness.

On Wednes­day, cities across Amer­i­ca are prepar­ing for more im­mi­gra­tion protests. —WASH­ING­TON (CMC)