Federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement says they will step up efforts to deport undocumented immigrant families. Those families are likely to live in major U.S. cities who've been given orders for removal.
Earlier this week, President Donald Trump tweeted that millions of immigrants will be deported by ICE. The agency later stated they will focus on removing recently arrived undocumented immigrants who’ve already been denied legal status.
“This might be a targeted situation where they’re looking for these people who’ve already had their hearings and that might be who they’re referring to in that specific tweet," said Raquel Hecht, a Eugene immigration attorney.
However, Hecht said, ICE announcing they're deporting specific individuals is more complicated than what she's seen locally.
“The reality is that ICE is picking up people randomly and arbitrarily who are not on the expedited docket who do not have criminal convictions, who have been in this community many, many years,” Hecht said.
Hecht says Trump’s tweet about deporting millions of people was political and designed to stir up fear. And that fear, is precisely what Eugene Police Chief Skinner is looking to mitigate.
"Oregon provides statues that speaks pretty clearly about the utilization of local resources to enforce federal immigration law. Sometimes people don’t necessarily know we’re prohibited from engaging in those types of activities," Skinner said.
Skinner sent out a letter addressing the Eugene immigrant community to reassure them that EPD doesn't engage in immigration matters.
"I know the federal government is going down this path, but people need to need to understand what our position is here in Eugene, and what the position of the Eugene Police Department is because I know we do have a lot of fear in some of those communities," Skinner said.
