New Orleans hotel collapse survivor deported. Was it retaliation?

By: Charles Montgomery

On October 12, the Hard Rock Hotel collapsed in New Orleans while under construction. Over a dozen workers were injured and two people even died.

At the beginning of December, Delmer Ramirez Palma who survived the collapse was deported by the ICE. Now, many people believe it was because of comments that Palma made.

According to Palma’s lawyer, he was vocal about faulty work conditions at the hotel site and it is now believed that those statements are connected to his deportation. Bryan Cox, a spokesman for the ICE told CNN, “Claims that Mr. Ramirez Palma’s removal was connected to media statements are patently false and irresponsible,” said Cox. “Mr. Ramirez Palma’s latest application for a stay of removal had already been denied by ICE on October 3, more than a week prior to the incident cited by his supporters.”

Ramirez had told his supervisor that his laser leveling tool showed that the building was tilting two to three inches before the collapse. The biggest concern that people have is that Ramirez’s arrest could cause other witnesses and sources that are immigrants to not come forward because they will be concerned about their safety.

In the following map, I have listed some ICE raids that have made national headlines and some smaller operations completed by the ICE in the last few months.

In the following chart, I have listed the amount of arrests each year by the ICE. The chart begins in 2009 during the Obama administration and continues through 2018 in the Trump administration.

Data received here. Chart created by Charles Montgomery.

The largest concern that officials have is that the arrest of Ramirez will silence other potential witnesses that are illegal immigrants. For now, the arrest will hold Ramirez out of further investigations.

After ICE: How a Mississippi town has dealt with the raid months later

By: Charles Montgomery

It has been three months since the ICE raids in Mississippi that saw 680 plant workers get arrested. Within hours many of the arrested were released, but in October, nearly 300 were still detained.

Now, many of the immigrants that were a part of the operation are afraid to work and even talk to the press. From an article on The Intercept, “These people are afraid to talk, to go out, to be seen. I am running the risk of talking because I want people to hear us, to realize that we are all going through a very difficult time.”

Video found on The Intercept

Despite the support given to many of these immigrants in hard times, it was reported earlier in November that many of the workers had been working under stolen identity. It was reported that over 400 United States citizens identities were stolen by the arrested immigrants in these raids.

One of the biggest issues that lawmakers and American citizens raised with the raids were the children that were left abandoned at school because their parents were arrested. Superintendent of Morton schools in Mississippi, Tony McGee talked to NPR about what went down at the schools during the raids.

“We have plans for tornadoes, we have plans for a fire. “But you know, ICE raid is not one that is really on that radar.” Of the 680 people arrested in the state-wide raid, 342 were arrested in Morton.

For now, many of the immigrants arrested are still detained, while others are awaiting court dates. No company officials have been charged that employed these immigrants.

ICE Conducts Raid in Nebraska

It has been confirmed that earlier this week, ICE agents conducted a raid in Madison, Nebraska and arrested 14 people.

The Immigrant Legal Center released this statement on Tuesday, “ILC has confirmed a workplace raid in Madison, Nebraska. Details are still emerging as of right now 14 individuals are known to have been apprehended.”

The raid occurred at D&D industries. Out of the 14 people arrested, 11 are from Mexico and three are from Guatemala. D&D industries is listed as a pallet and skids manufacturer.

This is the largest reported ICE raid since the Mississippi chicken plant raids in August. It is the first reported ICE raid since five people were taken into custody during a raid that took place in Chicago in September.

It was reported that a local high school was providing space for Centro Hispano and other representatives that want to help the families of the detained.

The story is continuing to develop with updates still being provided.

Trump Vetoes Wall Legislation

On October 15, President Trump vetoed a bill that would block his emergency declaration of the border wall. This legislation was an effort by Congress to kill the national emergency declaration that transferred billions of dollars to the border wall construction.

On Thursday, the Senate failed to override the veto as the final vote was 53-36 in favor of the veto. In a recent message to the Senate, President Trump said this, “the situation on our southern border remains a national emergency, and our Armed Forces are still needed to help confront it.”

The border wall has been a great topic of debate for the last week with a federal judge ruling against President Trump’s emergency declaration last Friday. This veto by President Trump is his sixth of his presidency. This is the second legislation he has vetoed about the border wall. The first coming in March 2019.

Border Wall: As impenetrable as Trump thinks?

Throughout his campaign and his time in office, President Trump has continuously said that the wall will be built and that it will be impenetrable. A man in Kentucky recently built a replica of the border wall to test that theory.

Rick Weber in Rogers, Kentucky recently constructed a replica section of the wall using the official dimensions of the wall and pictures. Weber founded the Muir Valley rocking climbing park and recently told TIME magazine, “You don’t tell a bona fide rock climber something’s impossible to climb.”

The replica officially stands at 18-feet with a 60-inch plate at the top. In some places, the wall will be as high as 30 feet on the border.

The most impressive climber of this wall? An eight year old girl who didn’t use any safety ropes or other tools. She only wore a safety harness to climb the 18 foot replica.

One climber claims that she did it in 21 seconds free climbing and in 30 seconds with a rope. Keelan Utzinger said,”I did it in 21 seconds free-climbing and then 30 seconds with the rope.” “But, I feel like the rope is something that anyone could get up and over it with.”

Weber has even claimed that the certain modifications of the wall like the gaps and grabbing the panel’s edge makes climbing the wall simple. If they were no gaps, according to Weber, it would be a lot more difficult to climb the wall.

President Trump recently said on a visit to the wall construction site, ” So it’s a very powerful, very powerful wall — the likes of which, probably, to this extent, has not been built before.” The president is obviously convinced that the wall cannot be climbed.

If it’s so impossible, then why are people easily doing it in Kentucky on Weber’s model?

Many people have made visits to Kentucky to try their hand at the replica wall. Will these feats by experienced climbers cause President Trump to modify his “unbeatable” wall?

Trump’s Border Wall: What’s real and what isn’t

One of the main reasons why Donald Trump was elected was because of his promise for a new reinforced wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. Last month, President Trump insisted, “The wall is being built. It’s going up rapidly.” Let’s take a look at how much that is true.

According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, there is only a total of 69 miles of new border system. In reality, most of this isn’t new wall, but improvements on old structures since there is already 650 miles of barriers along the border.

The administration does plan however, to have 509 miles of new border wall built by the end of 2020. Of course, things should begin to speed up because of the national emergency the president declared a few months ago.

Like I said in my recent posts, that move by the president was ruled against by a federal judge last week and even called unlawful. President Trump did veto a legislation to end the national emergency at the border. One of the main goals of this reinforced border wall is to stop illegal immigration.

The problem is, many illegal immigrants are already here. So, what has President Trump done in recent months to arrest these illegal immigrants? ICE raids.

I have been covering ICE raids for the past three months and there have been some large operations conducted across the country. So, if President Trump does in fact get his border wall completed, will illegal immigration go down?

We’ll have to wait and find out.

Why Some Republicans Support Trump’s Border Wall

Despite the backlash that President Trump has received for his decision to transfer federal funds for his border wall; many Republicans still support him in the government.

It was recently reported that a federal judge ruled against President Trump taking federal funds to build the wall. The judge went as far as to call it “unlawful.”

However, many Republicans believe the move by Trump was necessary and that it doesn’t effect them at all. South Carolina Republicans believe the state can fully recoup the nearly $11 million that President Trump used for the wall.

Senator Tim Scott even said that he received personal assurances from acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney that a new fire station for Laurel Bay would still be completed.

Even Virginia Republicans are supporting President Trump’s decision to use funds to work on the wall. Many believe it is a national security concern and that it is one of the most important things right now.

Republican Rob Wittman says, “I think we can do both and I think we have to do both.” Obviously, Republicans are falling behind their President to support him no matter backlash.

We’ll keep an eye on any developing stories on President Trump’s border wall.

People are Upset about the Border Wall. Why?

Despite all of these impeachment propositions and other allegations that have come raining down on President Trump, the border wall is still being built.

Throughout Trump’s administration, his proposal for the border wall has been met with mixed criticism. Today, I would like to focus on how people feel about the recent developments in Arizona with the border wall construction.

Just last week, construction began in Arizona on a section of the border all. In order for workers to build that section, they are having to go through the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. However, Customs and Border Protection did indicate that 110 desert plants have been relocated and that unhealthy plants have been bulldozed.

These recent developments aren’t going over too well for many people. This quote from an NPR article gives a good idea of how one journalist feels. “But a half-mile away, a big yellow bulldozer was scraping the desert clean and mowing down cactus columns that were likely older than the young man operating the dozer.”

One of the biggest problems people have had with the construction of the wall in Arizona is that President Trump has moved billions of dollars in federal funds to build the wall.

In February, President Trump declared a state of emergency to get funds moved over to start construction on the border wall. Now, after months work a judge rejected the funding scheme but he even went as far to say the use of federal funds was unlawful.

People are celebrating the decision by Judge David Briones and are waiting to see if anything will develop from his decision.

Congressional Hearing Announced for Mississippi Raids

It has been announced that on November 7, there will be a congressional hearing on the controversial ICE raids that occurred in Mississippi in August of this year.

Just to jog your memory about these ICE raids in Mississippi, let me give you some updates. 680 undocumented immigrants were arrested on August 7 at different chicken plants. Within two days, nearly half of those arrested were released.

Many people were upset that many children came home to no parents because both parents had been arrested in the raids. This caused serious backlash against the ICE and it is the main reason for this congressional hearing next month.

U.S. representative Bernie Thompson talked on Wednesday on how he believes the raids were illegal and improper and that the ICE didn’t prepare for many children to not have parents.

“We still don’t have a proper explanation of why the federal government planned and executed these raids without accounting for the impact on children, families, and the community,” Thompson said. “Because of this negligence, dozens of children went home after their first day of school to find that one or both of their parents were nowhere to be found.”  (Clarion Ledger 2019)

Representative Thompson believes the hearing will be important because it will give community members an opportunity to voice their opinion on the administration’s immigration policies. The hearing will take place at Tougaloo College and it will be a public field hearing.

Are People Paying Attention to ICE raids?

ICE raids became a hot topic of debate in early July this year. President Trump announced to the nation that significant ICE operations would get underway in large U.S. cities.

ICE raids captivated the nation for nearly two months, but now large raids aren’t occurring as often as they were. So, are people paying attention to ICE raids anymore?

Last week I brought to light the recent ICE operations in Chicago that drew incredible backlash from Chicago residents. Many people took to protesting the actions of the ICE against immigrants because of the Chicago police being forced to get involved.

Erik McGregor/Pacific Press/LightRocket/Getty Images

An interesting story that came out today is that the ICE is apparently using fake Facebook accounts to try to arrest illegal immigrants. According to certain sources, this isn’t the first time the ICE has used Facebook to try and arrest immigrants.

In 2015, the ICE used Facebook to try and catch students in Michigan. These actions by the ICE actually violates Facebook’s rules. The rules do not allow the running of accounts with fake names or accounts that mislead people.

That was one of the first major ICE operations since the Mississippi raids in August. The ICE has been around since after the 9/11 attacks, but no one has paid attention to it more until President Trump took office.

This is because of President Trump’s stand on immigration and his plan to build a border wall. Using google trends, this is how much people have been searching about ICE raids.

This is a graph of how often people have googled, ICE raids. As you can clearly see, it has gone up because of Trump’s announcement in July and the raids in August.

The following graph is the amount of times that people googled ICE raids since Trump took office in January 2017.

As you can see, not many people really looked at ICE raids before July of this year. This is not as surprising as one might think because the media didn’t truly start covering ICE raids as much until this summer.

That’s it for this week’s ICE raids update.

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