Thread: PA. Nutter to end agreement with ICE on detention

Nutter to end agreement with ICE on detention

Shar
TROY GRAHAM AND MICHAEL MATZA, INQUIRER STAFF WRITERS
POSTED: Thursday, February 20, 2014, 1:08 AM


PHILADELPHIA Mayor Nutter is poised to sign an executive order largely ending a controversial agreement that allowed federal agents to detain undocumented immigrants arrested in the city on even minor offenses.

City Councilman James F. Kenney, who called for a hearing on the policy, said letting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) hold prisoners based on their immigration status has "a chilling effect on people who would think of coming here, documented or undocumented."

"People are being detained and deported unnecessarily, relative to what they did," he said. "It smacks of not wanting certain groups of people in the country."

A draft of Nutter's unsigned order, obtained by The Inquirer, would end the holds for immigrants, except those charged with first- or second-degree felonies involving violence.

Some critics of the holds say Nutter's action won't go far enough. They want the mayor to end all cooperation with ICE.

Immigrants - including those living here legally on green cards - can be deported if they are convicted of a felony. But Councilwoman Maria Quiñones Sánchez said it's not fair to hold immigrants arrested on felony charges if they would otherwise be freed on bail.

"Charging doesn't make someone guilty," she said. "What you don't want is a situation where they're deported before they're convicted."

Mark McDonald, a spokesman for Nutter, said the mayor was likely to sign an order in "a few weeks," but he would not discuss its contents.

McDonald said the agreement with ICE had been under discussion since summer.

"I think the feeling is, we addressed the overwhelming amount of concerns, but not all of them," he said, adding, "We don't have a finished product."

The agreement with ICE has given the agency access to the city's offender database, which lists a person's country of origin, since 2008.

Under pressure from advocates, the city made changes in 2010 so that ICE agents would not be able to see information on victims and witnesses.

Nutter said at the time that allowing ICE access to that information would discourage immigrants from cooperating with police.

Advocates for immigrant communities have been fighting to end cooperation with ICE here and in other cities, saying the policy traumatizes those communities and wastes taxpayer dollars on jailing people who would otherwise be released.

Philadelphia participates in several immigration enforcement programs, some of which are federally mandated, and others, such as "ICE holds," that are "nonmandatory requests" for assistance, said Nicole Kligerman, a spokeswoman for the New Sanctuary Movement of Philadelphia.

She said about 17 localities have banned or modified ICE holds, including Miami, San Francisco, Newark, New Orleans, and New York City.

"There's no reason why the City of Brotherly Love can't follow that national trend," she said.

But New Sanctuary and other groups also complained that they had not been consulted about the executive order. (McDonald said the administration met with advocates in the summer to hear their concerns.)

Erika Almiron, executive director of Juntos, a South Philadelphia group for Latino immigrants, said advocates had not seen a copy of the draft order.

"We are asking for transparency," she said. "The immigrant community should have some involvement and voice about what it looks like."

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tgraham@phillynews.com

http://www.philly.com/philly/news/po...VCcSgOLdIEK.99

Nutter reverses city rules on detained immigrants

Mayor Nutter on Tuesday changed the rules about what information the city shares with the federal government about some immigrants, a policy shift that will last less than two weeks.

Mayor-elect Jim Kenney has vowed to roll back the change, which has been under discussion for six weeks, after he is sworn into office on Jan. 4. A Kenney spokesman on Tuesday confirmed that he still plans to do that.

Nutter altered his 2014 executive order, which barred the city's Police Department and prison system from complying with federal requests to detain undocumented immigrants who otherwise would be released pending trial or after having served sentences.

The city will now, if asked by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency (ICE), provide information about when someone will be released from custody if the federal government says that person is engaged in or suspected of terrorism or espionage, or is being released after a conviction as part of a "criminal street gang" or for a first-degree felony involving violence, unlawful possession of a gun, or drug trafficking.

As with Nutter's 2014 order, the city will not hold someone unless ICE gets a federal detention order.Nutter won acclaim last year from immigration activists for making Philadelphia one of 22 "sanctuary cities" that refused to comply with "ICE holds," which called for detention without an order from a federal judge.

Kenney was among the City Council members and immigration-aid groups that pushed last year for Nutter to issue the order.

Nutter, speaking at a City Hall news conference where unhappy immigration activists outnumbered reporters, stressed that he was making a "narrow change," acting on a promise he made to President Obama and Jeh Johnson, secretary
of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, to review his executive order.

He said changes that were made in moving from the controversial federal Secured Communities program, which prompted that order last year, to the "much more flexible" Priority Enforcement Program addressed his concerns about
sharing information on immigrants.

Johnson responded to Nutter's change in policy with a statement Tuesday that called it "good for the public safety" in Philadelphia to "prevent dangerous, removable criminals from being released to the streets."

Erika Almiron, director of Juntos, a South Philadelphia group that serves Latino immigrants, told Nutter during his news conference she sees little change from the old federal program to the new one.

"What we don't understand is how you can think this is any different from another dragnet program that in the end will impact our community," she said. "You have two weeks left [as mayor]. What do you get out of this?"

Nutter again said his action was about keeping a promise to the president.

"This has nothing to do with dragnets or snatching people up off the street," Nutter said. "These are folks who are already in custody."

Nutter, asked if he knew if Kenney would keep the change in policy in place, said: "We have not had that level of conversation."

"I'm sure he will be diligent and take the time to read through this and have further discussions," said Nutter, who added that he did not want to predict Kenney's decision.

Nutter briefly engaged with the activists after the news conference. They chanted "Shame, shame, shame" as he left.

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