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It appears the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is gearing up for an immigration enforcement operation in Miami this weekend.
According to emails obtained by New Times, a group of deportation officers from out of state is headed to Miami this weekend to assist Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) Miami with a 287(g) operation. The emails contain no specific information about the operation. The officers are instructed to equip themselves in much the same way as other details conducting enforcement operations in other U.S. cities.
New Times has emailed DHS for more information about the purported operation.
Through the 287(g) program, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) partners with state and local law enforcement agencies to grant their officers federal immigration enforcement powers. Dozens of sheriff’s offices and municipalities across Florida have signed 287(g) agreements to help President Donald Trump enforce his nationwide immigration crackdown. Under its 287(g) partnership with ICE, Florida Highway Patrol (FHP) officers account for the highest number of encounters with suspected undocumented immigrants. More than 87 percent of those arrested by FHP stemmed from federal immigration charges, according to the state dashboard.
The Trump administration has sent ICE agents to cities across the nation to carry out Trump’s deportation goals. In September, DHS launched an immigration enforcement operation dubbed “Operation Midway Blitz” in Illinois after a 20-year-old woman, Katie Abraham, was killed in a drunk-driving, hit-and-run by an undocumented immigrant.
“This operation will target the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens in Chicago, DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement at the time. “For years, Governor Pritzker and his fellow sanctuary politicians released Tren de Aragua gang members, rapists, kidnappers, and drug traffickers on Chicago’s streets — putting American lives at risk and making Chicago a magnet for criminals.”
As protesters and immigration activists continued to clash with ICE agents in Illinois amid the large-scale enforcement operation, Abraham’s mother, Denise Lorence, wrote in an op-ed in the Chicago Tribune this week that her daughter would not want to be associated with Trump’s deportation efforts in Chicago.
“With this compassion and empathy in mind, Katie would not want to be associated with an operation in which kids witness their parents being taken into custody on their way to or from school,” Lorence wrote. “She wouldn’t support scaring kids with the use of military efforts in their neighborhoods or in their apartment buildings.”
To further support enforcement operations in South Florida, the Trump administration is looking for office space in Sunrise and Fort Lauderdale, according to a solicitation posted on the General Services Administration (GSA) website. While the GSA website does not specifically name which agency is looking for office space, NPR and the Washington Post have previously reported that the solicitation is on behalf of ICE.
As of September 30, 59,762 people were held in ICE detention nationwide.
