Refusal to nationalize border abuses

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Washington, DC – Below is a column by Maribel Hastings from America’s Voice en Español translated to English from Spanish. It ran in several Spanish-language media outlets earlier this week:

President Donald Trump believes that his immigration raids “haven’t gone far enough” despite the chaos, terror, family separation, damage to the economy, and particularly the violence on the part of ICE and Border Patrol agents.

But in Tuesday’s elections, voters spoke clearly, and although the economy remains the driving factor in how they voted, the raids and mass deportations influenced their vote for Democrats precisely because Trump has gone too far. An SSRS exit poll in Virginia found that 77% of Latino voters believe Trump’s immigration actions have gone too far. The same is true for 53% of the general electorate in Virginia.

New York City elected Zohran Mamdani as its mayor, and he had a message for Trump: “New York will remain a city of immigrants, a city built by immigrants, powered by immigrants — and as of tonight, led by an immigrant.”

The violence of immigration policy has taken its toll on the country. If the images and videos of agents’ interventions with immigrants and U.S. citizens prove anything, it is that as operations intensify, the level of violence increases.

It is as if the agents were auditioning for a Trump reality show, and whoever displays the most cruelty and aggression wins the favor of the president and his anti-immigrant entourage. Or even a bonus or a promotion.

In July, ProPublica reported on how ICE and Border Patrol agents have increasingly smashed car windows during traffic stops to meet immigrant arrest quotas, which also resulted in the detention of U.S. citizens.

As of July, ProPublica identified 50 cases of agents violently breaking car windows in the first six months of the Trump administration, compared to just eight instances in the previous decade.

“Officers who break glass aren’t being disciplined — they’re being promoted,” ProPublica wrote. A Maryland official involved in one of these incidents, Matthew Elliston, “now occupies a senior position at headquarters and oversees field operations on the East Coast.”

The other, Gregory Bovino, who also used the tactic of breaking car windows, went from being sector chief of Border Patrol in El Centro, California, to leading raids in Los Angeles and now in Chicago. There, he was filmed throwing tear gas canisters at demonstrators without apparent cause.

According to John Sandweg, former acting chief of Border Patrol during Barack Obama’s second term, “all of this is unprecedented.”

What has been happening for years at the border, excesses and abuses by Border Patrol, is now being seen in real time in cities across the country, and the entire nation is witnessing it.

The Southern Border Communities Coalition (SBCC) asserts that Border Patrol “systematically violates the rights of border community members.” “Countless cases of abuse and fatal encounters with CBP have been documented. Thousands of federal agents patrol the border region with impunity, stopping and searching border communities through extraordinary and unprecedented powers. Under these powers, agents interrogate people, board and search their vehicles and other conveyances, and enter private property (but not dwellings) without a warrant.”

The coalition documented at least 351 deaths as a result of an encounter with Customs and Border Protection agents since 2010. “CBP’s culture of abuse and reckless use of force has led to the deaths of many U.S. citizens and noncitizens, both at U.S. ports of entry and in the southern border region. A majority of victims are killed in fatal shootings, while a significant number have died as a result of reckless car chases, untreated medical issues, and potential neglect, or other forms of violence.”

As part of the Trump administration’s anti-immigrant crusade, there have already been many reports of deplorable conditions in detention centers and deaths due to negligence and lack of access to medical care and medications to control chronic conditions such as high blood pressure or diabetes. This is another form of violence.

But what we are witnessing in Chicago and Los Angeles, where even citizens are victims of violence and force by federal agents, is the nationalized abuse of power as part of the militarization of cities and states led by Democrats.

And it seems that the worst is yet to come.

The original Spanish version is here.