Pro-amnesty demonstrators from the Alabama Coalition for Immigrant Justice (ACIJ) chained themselves to the doors of the Etowah County Detention Center on Monday in protest of US immigration policy. According to a press release from ACIJ, they were protesting the fact that roughly 2 million illegal immigrants have been deported in the past 5 years.
According to FOX 6, the activists claimed that some of their friends and family had been deported for what they referred to as “minor offenses,” such as running a stop sign. In reality, no one gets deported for running a stop sign. But over 100,000 people were, indeed, deported from the interior of the United States last year for being in the country illegally.
The Washington Times provided some good perspective on the deportation issue in a piece published this past December:
The Obama administration deported just 1 percent of illegal immigrants living within the interior of the U.S. last year, according to statistics released Thursday, which signals that most illegal immigrants face little chance of being kicked out of the country.
In fiscal year 2013, which ended Sept. 30, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement removed 133,551 immigrants, down more than 25 percent from the previous year, even as the estimated number of illegal immigrants grew to 11.7 million.
The numbers underscore the lack of capacity — and of political will — to remove most illegal immigrants.
The administration said the drop in interior enforcement is deliberate as it tries to focus more on border security and recent border crossers, and to go after immigrants in the interior only if they have amassed serious criminal records.
Back in Alabama, somewhere between 80 and 100 protestors continued their demonstration Monday, even after arrests were made outside the Etowah County Detention Center, which they called “part of the largest immigrant detention infrastructure in the world.”
The protestors wore “Alabama Unafraid” t-shirts and chanted “Obama, have a heart” and “When I say human, you say rights” as they marched.
“I decided to take action today because I am no longer afraid to speak up,” said Evelyn Servin of Russellville, Ala.
“I personally know the feeling of being separated from my family by deportation because my father was deported,” added David Comparan of Dothan, Ala. “I’m here to say that the President can and needs to stop deportations today.”
The Etowah County Sheriff’s office said they supported the protestors’ right to demonstrate, but said they were compelled to make arrests when the protestors chained themselves to the building and blocked the entrance, rather than remaining on the sidewalk where sheriff’s deputies asked them to stand.
“While we respect the right of all citizens to peacefully protest, we cannot and will not allow individuals to disrupt the day to day operations of the Sheriff’s Office nor will we allow any group to prevent other citizens from conducting business at this office,” said Etowah County Sheriff Todd Entrekin.
“The people we have in our detention center aren’t farmers or field hands who have been picked up off farms,” Entrekin added Tuesday. “These are all felons who have orders for deportation.”
The seven protestors who were arrested Monday were booked into the Etowah County Detention Center on a $1,500 bond.
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