Jessica (from the Smoke Signal): From what I read, do you have any particular thoughts or experiences with these ICE raids?
Anonymous: So I guess I I’ll talk about what I’ve learned about it, and also, maybe from my perspective as a government teacher. So the one thing that I was just reading about over the weekend is that Northern California actually had one of the lowest arrest rates by ice in the entire country. And it seems like it’s from a few factors, but one of the big ones is that in Northern California, we have kind of some sanctuary walls where law enforcement and city officials are not supposed to cooperate with ice. And so that would be a good thing to like, if you can get access to the Chronicle to read through that and maybe incorporate that into it, because it’s very specific to our area. So in general, I would say that I find the behavior of ice really concerning from a constitutional standpoint. The Supreme Court has ruled in the past that people need to be treated with the same … The Supreme Court has ruled that whether you are a citizen, undocumented or a legal resident, that you have the same legal rights no matter what. And so people being deported without hearing that directly flies in the face of previous rulings. And like, I would say, like American values and I think that it is also concerning that people who have spoken in ways that maybe the administration disagrees with that they’re in practice being intimidated reading about students who were deported or detained because they had written about Israel and Palestine, for example, that really, I think, violates our values when it comes to freedom of expression. So yeah, I find it all pretty troubling.
Jessica: Do you have personal experience, or, do you know people who have been deported, or, have the threat of being deported?
Anonymous: That’s a good question. So if you put this in the article, I would say I would want this to be anonymous, but you know, I’m from the Central Valley. My grandfather was a farmer, so I know a number of people from where I grew up, and also I have friends whose parents are undocumented, and so I think that they’re kind of living in deeper and coming up with contingency plans on what to do if they are deported. And the people that I personally know who are undocumented are really fantastic contributors to their communities, really hard working and good people. And so seeing them go through that is really, really difficult and really upsetting. I think that yeah, and I think that for the average person, they probably know someone who is undocumented, and they just don’t know it. And I think putting that, keeping that in mind, can maybe give us a bit more empathy. Now, they did do a civil offense, and I think that it’s fair to have rule of law and have rules enforced, but it’s not a criminal offense to be undocumented, and that’s not how it’s being treated by the administration.
Jessica: I see, okay. Do you feel like the California government is effective at protecting its immigrants and will make sure that you know like what’s going on in the East Coast right now won’t happen here?
Anonymous: I mean, obviously, like, Los Angeles was the first place where a lot of, like, the crackdown happened, and I think that California has a, like, their government has a little bit of limited power, yeah, I don’t know. It’s kind of hard, because the courts are often looking against some of the actions are happening, and sometimes those holdings are being ignored by the administration. So I don’t know. I feel like they’re doing the best they can the administration California, but that there are limits to their abilities.
Jessica: Okay, thank you so much.