Vice President Vance hopes US raids has ‘chilling effect’ on ‘illegal’ immigrants coming into US
JD Vance statement comes as the Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested over 1,000 people across the US for “illegal” immigration into the country
US Vice President JD Vance supported the immigration raids on schools and hoped that the renewed crackdown by the Donald Trump administration would have a “chilling effect on illegal immigrants coming to our country”.
Vance refused to rule out the possibility of immigration raids targeting religious buildings and said such measures are “not unique” to immigration.
“If you have a person who is convicted of a violent crime, whether they are an illegal immigrant or not, you have to go and get that person to protect the public safety,” Vance said.
Also read | Colombia takes U-turn on US deportation flights after Donald Trump's tariff call
The vice president's statement comes as Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested over 1,000 people across the US for “illegal” immigration into the country. 956 arrests were made on Sunday, followed by 286 on Saturday. While some of the operations may not have been unusual, ICE averaged 311 daily arrests in the fiscal year that ended September 30 last year, AP reported.
Donald Trump administration officials, including “border czar” Tom Homan and the acting deputy attorney general, visited Chicago on Sunday to oversee the “operation” targeting “illegal” immigrants.
Also read | What is FEMA, US emergency agency Trump wants to ‘get rid of’?
The details of the operation have not been made public, but AP reported that the involvement of more federal agencies showed Donald Trump's willingness to implement his campaign promise to crack down on “illegal” immigrants.
The Republican administration has expanded immigration enforcement powers to agencies in the Department of Justice, including the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF).
Acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove told the AP that he observed immigration agents from the DHS, along with agents from the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives.
“We will support everyone at the federal, state, and local levels who join this critical mission to take back our communities. We will use all available tools to address obstruction and other unlawful impediments to our efforts to protect the homeland. Most importantly, we will not rest until the work is done,” Bove said.
Governor JB Pritzker, a Democrat, questioned the Donald Trump administration's aggressive approach and said it would have a "chilling effect" on law-abiding immigrants who have been residing in the US for years.
Several rights groups in Chicago filed a lawsuit seeking an injunction on certain raids.
"Immigrant communities who have called Chicago their home for decades are scared. We refuse to live in fear and will fight any attempts to roll back the work we’ve done to keep families together," said Antonio Gutierrez from Organized Communities Against Deportation.
(With AP inputs)
