Mother and Three Children Swept Up in Upstate New York ICE Raid Released After Locals Pitch Fierce Protest

A mother and her three children who were detained late last month by immigration officials conducting a raid on a dairy farm have been released following fierce protests that saw almost as many people in the streets as there are residents in the small upstate New York community. The family’s release was announced Monday by the superintendent of the children’s school district in Sackets Harbor, New York. The New York village on the shore of Lake Ontario, a majority of which has voted for Republican presidential candidates in every election cycle since 2000, happens to be the hometown of Mr. Trump’s border tsar, Tom Homan. “My colleagues and I are relieved and grateful to share that, after eleven days of uncertainty, our students and their mother are returning home,” the local school superintendent, Jennifer Gaffney, stated. “In the midst of this difficult time, the strength, compassion, and resilience of our community have shone through. We are very thankful to everyone who has reached out with kindness and offered support.”The mother and her third, tenth, and 11th grade children were taken into custody on March 27 when Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers conducted an early morning raid on a dairy farm in Sackets Harbor in search of an individual charged with possession of child pornography. The officials ended up detaining the family along with three other undocumented immigrants. The mother and her three children, who are not American citizens, were taken on March 27 to a private detention center in Texas where they were held until their release. Local school officials were quick to protest their detainment, lamenting that the children “were doing everything right.” The kids, they claimed, had declared themselves to immigration judges, attended court on their assigned dates, and were following the legal protocol to remain legally in the country. Members of the village soon showed up in droves to protest the family’s detainment. Demonstrations continued through the weekend, with a rally on Saturday drawing an estimated 1,000 marchers. Sackets Harbor boasts an estimated population of 1,400. During Saturday’s protest, participants trekked two miles to Mr. Homan’s residence, holding signs with slogans like “Bring our Kids Back,” “Power of the People Not People in Power,” “We are all immigrants,” and “Tom Homan Took Our Kids.” Among the marchers was Jaime Cook, the principal of the Sackets Harbor Central School, where the detained students are enrolled. Ms. Cook has been vocal in her support of the students, declaring shortly after the March incident that “we are in shock, and it is that shared shock that has unified our community in the call for our students’ release.”During the protest, Ms. Cook recounted her personal experiences with the children, telling NBC News that “I’ve driven them to their house after tutoring sessions. I’ve picked them up for tutoring sessions. In this kind of town, this is a car pool town. I know them.” A local teacher, Jonna St. Croix, who got to know the children while they were students in her class, took a similar stand. “I see them every morning, and they have big smiles on their faces. They always say, ‘Good morning, Miss,’ and [I] give them a snack when they ask for one,” Ms. St. Croix said. “It’s very evident when there’s an empty desk, and we miss them.”The incident was denounced by New York’s governor, Kathy Hochul, who said that “I cannot think of any public safety justification for ICE agents to rip an innocent family, including a child in the third grade, from their Sackets Harbor home.” Ms. Hochul called for the family’s immediate release and lambasted ICE’s actions as “not the immigration enforcement promised to the American people. It’s just plain cruel.” In spite of the backlash, Mr. Homan defended the operation, telling reporters last week that “It wasn’t a raid. It was a search warrant execution at a house where a family was found in the country illegally. ICE is doing everything by the book. Once the investigation gets to the point where we don’t have an interest in this family, then a decision will be made on release.”

Mother and Three Children Swept Up in Upstate New York ICE Raid Released After Locals Pitch Fierce Protest

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