Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
– “The New Colossus,” Emma Lazarus
Here in the United States of America — a nation intentionally founded as a refuge for people fleeing poverty, religious intolerance and political persecution in many lands — a new order has just begun. A candidate whose campaign strategy was setting one segment of the working class against another is taking the reins of government, even as these words are being set down. The new president has sworn to begin deportations of undocumented immigrants on Day One of his second term. He has announced his intent to try to eliminate birthright citizenship as guaranteed in the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution. It’s a scenario that the Founders of the Republic could scarcely have imagined, back in the days when “open borders” were a point of national pride and identity.
For many of the 77 million US voters who opted for Trump, kicking out the people they like to denigrate as “illegals” is exactly the outcome they wanted. They bought into the characterization of undocumented workers as “criminals,” despite the studies showing that native-born US citizens are twice as likely as immigrants to commit violent and drug crimes and four times as likely to commit property crimes.
Those who have jumped on the anti-immigrant bandwagon, certainly don’t represent all Americans. Times are about to become a great deal more difficult for immigrants, documented or undocumented, but many citizens are saying “Not in my name” and determined to fight back. If you’ve ever wondered whether you’d have been brave enough to harbor escaping slaves in your cellar back in the days of the Underground Railroad, or to provide a “secret annex” for fugitive Jews or members of the Resistance in some European town during the Holocaust, the time is coming soon when comparable contemporary heroes will have opportunities to show their mettle.
Sanctuary city
There are ways to help that won’t get you thrown in jail, thanks to the efforts of a network of churches and not-for-profit organizations that have already laid the groundwork for a growing wave of public support for our immigrant neighbors. Here in Ulster County, an organization called Ulster Immigrant Defense Network (UIDN) sprang up shortly after the 2016 election, quickly took root and flourished. Father Frank Alagna, then pastor of Holy Cross/Santa Cruz Episcopal Church in Kingston and a leader of the Kingston Interfaith Council (KIC), had begun hearing troubling reports of bullying of Latino children in his congregation. “A few weeks later I found myself having to advise our Latino congregants that they needed to fill out documents that would indicate to whose care they wanted their children entrusted should they not return home one day because of an ICE initialed deportation,” he writes in his “origin story” for UIDN.
“These poignant experiences moved me to ask the KIC to join with me in petitioning the Kingston Common Council to declare Kingston a Sanctuary City as a way of letting our undocumented friends and neighbors know that they were not alone and that we cared,” Alagna continues. “The issue was raised for discussion at the December meeting of the Common Council,” which “broke a record for public attendance.” A slightly watered-down measure was adopted at the January 2017 meeting, stopping short of declaring outright noncooperation with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) but designating Kingston a “welcoming and inclusive community” that would not spend local tax money for local law enforcement agents to act as ICE surrogates.
In February 2017, Alagna called a meeting of clergy to discuss the possible need for houses of worship to offer traditional sanctuary to immigrants and refugees. According to official agency policy established by ICE director John Morton in 2011, churches, along with schools, hospitals, funerals, weddings, marches and rallies are designated “sensitive locations” where immigration enforcement actions can only be taken under very strictly defined circumstances and with high-level authorization.
Community response
Alagna mentioned the planned gathering at a well-attended Kingston Town Hall meeting the night before. The community response was stunning. “That Saturday morning, while I was expecting two dozen clergy, the parish hall was filled to overflowing with 140 people from both Ulster and Dutchess counties. A conversation began that transformed my rather modest idea of implementing traditional sanctuary and grew it into the many ways we could offer our undocumented neighbors an environment of ‘radical hospitality’ by identifying those times of increased vulnerability, like driving without a license to meet essential needs. We could provide drivers. Or anticipating an ICE raid and sending a Rapid Response Team to ensure that the rights of the individual who was being targeted were not violated. For example, entry could be legally refused if the ICE agent did not have a removal order signed by a judge. And very often ICE showed up without this,” he writes.
By the end of that meeting on the potential for offering sanctuary, the priest had a pile of contact information for dozens of people who were eager to volunteer. “UIDN was born that Saturday morning,” he writes. “These folks knew what needed to be done and took charge of and organized one service after another.”
Bilingual interpreters have been essential members of the UIDN volunteer team from the get-go. In 2017, undocumented immigrants could not qualify for a driver’s license in New York State: a major roadblock to integration into American society and economic life that also put them in peril of drawing the ire of ICE if they were caught driving illegally. So, one of UIDN volunteers’ first orders of business was offering transportation to immigrant residents who needed rides. The next step was assisting them with amassing the necessary paperwork to apply for a driver’s license. That task has become much less complicated since the passage in 2019 of the Driver’s License Access and Privacy Act, a/k/a the Green Light Law, which eliminated the requirement of having a Social Security number. Always having clear identification in the form of a driver’s license has been a game-changer for immigrants.
ICE raids
Another immediate need, under the first Trump administration, was to train and mobilize Rapid Response Teams to show up whenever an ICE raid was in progress, to inform immigrants of their rights and quell attempts by federal agents to intimidate them. Pastor Liz Estes of the Old Dutch Church in Kingston, clergy spokesperson for UIDN, cited one of the new president’s first executive orders in 2017 as wreaking “by far the most damage to immigrants” by deploying 10,000 new ICE agents to track down and take into custody any “removable aliens” with even the most trivial of criminal convictions on their records. At the time, according to Patricia Grossman, vice president of UIDN, “A broken taillight was cause for deportation.” New legislation reviving such stringent enforcement, known as the Laken Riley Act, has been passed this week in both the US House and Senate
A crucial detail in this enforcement process is the legal distinction between a judicial warrant and an administrative warrant. In order for ICE agents to arrest and deport someone, by law they need to present a warrant signed by a judge in whose jurisdiction the targeted person lives. “The Fourth and Fifth Amendments, protecting privacy and due process, apply to all people – not just citizens,” Estes points out. “There’s case law that was established in the 1980s.” But ICE agents will often show up with only an administrative warrant issued by their own agency, and frightened immigrants who don’t know their rights will let them in the door. “During the Trump years, ICE got trickier. They’ll come to the door and tell immigrants, ‘We’re following up on a fraud claim. We want to protect your credit card.’ They can do all kinds of things to intimidate people.” Ensuring that the targeted families know their legal rights is therefore a significant role that UIDN volunteers can play.
While working in a parish in New Jersey in 2006, when George W. Bush’s Operation Return to Sender was in effect, Estes witnessed dozens of her parishioners from Indonesia deported without due process, and she’s determined not to let that happen in Ulster County on her watch. “There’s learning that comes from living with people who went through all these things. The ordeal doesn’t end with the raid. These Indonesian families all lost their leases. The families needed to go on Medicaid. The kids were not in school because they didn’t have a stable address. Typically, the parent who stays is not the primary wage-earner, but a caretaker making minimum wage. There are universal consequences. What are we doing to our citizen children?”
Moreover, says Estes, families fearing deportation will often not seek essential services, trying to keep a low profile. “You have people who aren’t going to the hospital, aren’t sending their kids to school.” Incidents of domestic violence and other crimes often go unreported because immigrant victims are afraid to interact with the police. “We can’t have the rule of law if some people don’t feel safe exercising their rights. If you’re at risk of deportation, you will probably keep silent.”
Grossman concurs: “From the point of view of an immigrant, the law has been broken so many times, including by the police. We know their rights under constitutional law, but we also know what their experience is… You have to know how to protect yourself.”
Support from local officials
Both Grossman and Estes are full of praise for Ulster County sheriff Juan Figueroa, who was elected in 2018 on a platform emphasizing equal protection under the law for immigrants and has been a consistent ally to UIDN. He championed passage of the Green Light Law and is prepared to push back in court against agents who overstep their authority. “I believe in our system of laws. The Equal Protection Clause of the US Constitution’s 14th Amendment is the core of our legal system. You have the same rights as everyone else,” Figueroa said at a meeting of UIDN’s Deportation Coalition on December 2, 2024. “I do not want people living in the shadows. If people are afraid to work with law enforcement, there will be no witnesses to crimes. They won’t show up for jobs and schools. This is dangerous for law enforcement! When people live ‘underground,’ this is the lifeline of organized crime. This does not keep a community safe.”
At the same recent meeting, both Ulster County executive Jen Metzger and Kingston mayor Steve Noble reiterated their continued commitment to support the dignity, human rights and constitutional rights of our immigrant neighbors. Metzger, who worked for passage of the Green Light Law as a member of the State Senate in 2018, said, “We must continue to lead. It’s going to take all parts of our community to stand up for immigrants.” More recently, Metzger’s lack of enthusiasm for ICE raids has put her on the radar of Trump advisor Stephen Miller, who sent an e-mail to her and 248 other officials of “sanctuary jurisdictions” accusing them of “violating federal law.”
Assisting new arrivals
UIDN volunteers, along with two bilingual caseworkers, provide weekly groceries, donated furniture, household and school supplies, emergency financial aid for rent and utility bills; transportation to important meetings, medical appointments and court dates; guidance in filling out forms, navigating unfamiliar bureaucracies and coping with exploitive landlords. They helped a group of women organize a work co-op called the Blooming Queens of Clean that has since spun off into a self-supporting enterprise. “Our main service is our food pantry, which has only gotten bigger. We’re primarily a direct service organization,” Grossman says. “Everything happens through the helpline. That’s the portal to UIDN. They say what they need.”
Thus, there are volunteer opportunities available for people of any skill level who want to get involved, from packing boxes of groceries, delivering furniture, giving lifts or answering the phone to lobbying for legislation in Albany or providing legal advice. In anticipation of greater demand under a second Trump administration. Dave Clegg, former DA of Ulster County, has just joined our board. We will now redirect our legal budget to an internal, supervised program.”
Attorneys who might be interested in offering their services pro bono or at reduced rates are encouraged to get in touch. UIDN is also connecting volunteers with Department of Justice training programs that certify laypersons to represent immigrants in court under the auspices of a recognized organization.
One particular pressing unfilled need is for interpreters who can speak Q’eqchi’, a Mayan language spoken by Indigenous people in a region of Guatemala, Belize and southern Mexico that has been plagued by drought, failed crops and hunger in recent years. Spanish- and French-speakers are also useful.
How else is UIDN girding its loins to cope strategically with aggressive federal action against immigrants in the foreseeable future? “We’re going to do what we’re doing, but with more energy and support,” Estes says. She believes that the foundation has already been laid. “Over eight years, UIDN has developed this trust with the immigrant community, and that’s gold. We work with about 800 families.”
Part of that work right now is streamlining their channels of communication, according to Grossman. “We have plans. We can convene in the church or communicate electronically. Smaller groups are better than large groups.”
Recruiting hearts and minds to the cause is tricky in a time when party affiliations are so intensely polarized, of course. “The Kingston Interfaith Council got together observing Martin Luther King weekend and asking, ‘How are we going to get our congregations involved? They’re not politically homogeneous.’ Our challenge is to speak from a humanitarian perspective,” says Estes. “People on all sides of the political spectrum have a sense of compassion. What’s coming now can be a lot quieter than the fires in California, but can cause just as much devastation.”
“There may come a time when frightened families may need to be hosted in the homes of volunteers,” Grossman observes. “This would all go away if New York for All was passed.” The proposed piece of legislation known as the New York for All Act, Senate Bill S3076B, would prohibit the use of government resources for immigration enforcement, restrict the disclosure of sensitive information to ICE and US Customs and Border Protection (CBP), prohibit 287(g) agreements delegating federal immigration duties to local law enforcement officers and make clear that ICE cannot access non-public areas of government property without a judicial warrant.
“I’ve definitely noticed more involvement from people since [Trump] was elected,” says Grossman. “We need to enlist those feelings of outrage.” For those who are ready to take direct action, joining a neighborhood watch or Rapid Response Team may prove to be a crucial way to help protect vulnerable families. “Take pictures. Talk to the ICE agents,” Estes says. “What we’re asking is not for them to break the law, but simply to witness. It’s a humanitarian gift.”
To learn more about the Ulster Immigrant Defense Network and how you can help, visit https://ulsterimmigrantdefensenetwork.org.
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