WASHINGTON — Rep. Lauren Underwood (D-IL) is calling on all U.S. citizens, including children, to immediately obtain a passport, warning that federal immigration agents are operating with such reckless abandon that citizenship itself offers little protection. The call comes in the wake of an investigation by ProPublica detailing over 170 instances where U.S. citizens were detained, assaulted, and held incommunicado by immigration agencies.
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Speaking at the Capitol earlier this month, Rep. Underwood told me that the tremendous resources deployed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) have created a situation where “no one’s safe” in her district, which includes cities like Naperville and Aurora. She specifically cited the ProPublica findings that nearly 20 of those detained were children.
“That passport is how you prove your U.S. citizenship,” Underwood stressed. The Congresswoman, who has served as Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security, described the harrowing casework of citizens who are detained without documentation, forcing their families to rush paperwork to prevent them from remaining in “devastating, inhumane, cruel conditions for an extended period of time.” Her advice: “make that financial investment, get a passport for you and your children.”
The detention of citizens is a direct contradiction of public statements by top officials, including Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, who testified that agents “are not deporting US citizens.” Yet ProPublica’s investigation found cases of citizens who had presented birth certificates and Real IDs but were ignored, held for days, and in some cases, subjected to violence and racial profiling.
SCOOP: Federal Court Slams BIA for Unlawfully Rejecting Torture Claims
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