The office of Squad member Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., hosted a live webinar on Wednesday advising migrants in her district about their rights if they come face to face with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents looking to deport them.
The “Know Your Rights With ICE” virtual event was broadcast live on Ocasio-Cortez’s Facebook page, where migrant viewers were informed of how to deal with ICE search requests if officers come calling to their homes or place of work.
Migrants were also warned of “ruses” they allege ICE agents employ to get people to comply with searches, while the hosts also touted “trends” in how ICE conducts its searches, which have ramped up in recent weeks under the Trump administration.
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People were also recommended to record such searches and how to differentiate between different warrants ICE agents are likely to carry.
“Just because someone ends up on ICE radar and ICE believes that they can deport someone, it doesn’t mean that under the law the person can be deported or that they don’t have the option to fight their case to remain in the U.S.,” said Genia Blaser, of the Immigrant Defense Project a Manhattan-based non-profit. The group’s stated mission is to combat the targeting of immigrants for mass imprisonment and deportation.
“And even if during an encounter with ICE, what they’re doing doesn’t feel legal, or it doesn’t feel fair, it’s important to know that everyone has rights during their encounters with ICE,” Blaser said. “Everyone has rights regardless of their immigration status in the United States.”
The 54-minute live stream was aimed at migrants living in Ocasio-Cortez’s 14th District, which covers parts of Queens and the Bronx.
Ocasio-Cortez did not take part in the webinar but did upload tips to Instagram – via posters in both English and Spanish – and called on her followers to share the posters widely and study them.
“Our strategic advantage in this moment is our strength in numbers,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote. “It is time to use it. In nearly every way, we outnumber those who want to abuse their power and keep people in fear. The truth is, they cannot come after us all. That is why they actively USE and create fear: to get us to give up in advance and withdraw from public life without them lifting a finger.”
She also called on her followers to print out the posters and “tape them up in your workplace or keep them by your door.”
“So if ICE comes to your workplace or home, whether you are a citizen or noncitizen – YOU can defend your community and our constitution by exercising your right,” she wrote.
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During the webinar, the hosts told viewers that the Fourth Amendment – which provides protection from unreasonable searches and seizures by the government — applies to everyone, including migrants.
“So there’s a general rule here, which is in private spaces, ICE is going to need a warrant signed by a judge or your consent to enter that space or to do a search. When we’re talking about public spaces. ICE will need reasonable suspicion in order to make an arrest,” said another speaker, who identified herself as Laura.
She explained the difference between a judicial warrant and an administrative warrant, saying that only a judicial warrant gives ICE authority to initiate a search.
However, she said ICE rarely carries a judicial warrant, which means that ICE agents would need consent to enter a home.
“But they often use ruses or intimidation to try to trick people into doing or saying things that they can interpret as consent to enter,” she said.
“And so that’s really the purpose of ruses. Since they don’t have a warrant, they need to get your consent in order to enter they either want to deceive you into thinking that they’re not ICE or they lie so that you’ve come to believe that they do have a right to enter or they want to intimidate or scare you so that you don’t want to assert your rights.”
The hosts also recommend that people document interactions with ICE by video recording or taking notes, saying that this information could be useful to local immigrants’ rights groups as well as friends or family members.
They also shared their own trends about how ICE has been carrying out searches in recent weeks.
“In particular in recent weeks, ICE agents will go to homes early in the morning to make arrests,” Blaser said. “They’ll stop people on the street or in public places, which could include a public area of a workplace. So that could be the front of a restaurant or somewhere anyone from the public can walk in.”
She also said that unmarked ICE vehicles also stop cars as people are driving to work or home, while people who may be under an order of supervision have been taken into custody while checking in with ICE.
“It could be anywhere from two or three agents to a group of eight agents,” Blaser said. “They’re often very aggressive and the encounters can happen really quickly.”
Fox News Digital reached out to ICE for comment but did not immediately receive a response.
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