There has been a growing local concern about the ICE raids across the state and reports of treatment at the Everglades facility, where detainees are held.
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Grace Resendez McCaffery, publisher of Latina Gulf Coast and an advocate for the immigrant communities that span from Baldwin County in Alabama to Walton County in the panhandle, said her phone has been ringing nonstop for weeks.
“I don’t typically sleep very much, but I have hardly been able to sleep at all,” said McCaffery recently at the WUWF studio. “It’s too much commotion right now. Everybody’s frightened.”
Sometimes, all McCaffery can do is try to calm people down. After a raid in Baldwin County earlier this month, frantic calls came in about family members being taken away.
“It was just a matter of calming people down…to take a breath,” she said. “Literally telling people, ‘let’s breathe, let’s just breathe.”
When one of the teenagers who had been apprehended was let go, she shared the news on social media. It gave people “a little bit of hope,” she said.
ICE raids in the local area
McCaffery said she’s seen work sites abandoned and restaurants closed in recent weeks after raids.
Daily ICE arrests in Florida have increased 219% from last year, according to USA Today. Several other states have had record-breaking ICE arrests following the White House’s crackdown on immigration since President Trump took office.
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Florida Highway Patrol has been leading the charge, said Governor Ron DeSantis, on Friday morning at a press conference in Orlando. The governor praised FHP for apprehending nearly 3,000 undocumented immigrants since March. A new strike team called Immigration Enforcement, which will exist within the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles' Bureau of Criminal Investigations and Intelligence, will increase such arrests.
According to the Governor’s office, in the past month, FHP has arrested gang members, an undocumented person wanted for murder in Guatemala, and one who was trafficking 30 pounds of marijuana.
“FHP is committed to working with local and federal partners to uphold our immigration laws,” said Governor Ron DeSantis in a press release. “Americans deserve to be safe from the harms of illegal immigration, and Florida is charging full speed ahead to deliver.”
McCaffery expresses concerns for undocumented immigrants who have not committed serious crimes, but may be targeted.
“It creates fear,” she said. “Authorities will say that they’re arresting criminals, but they rarely say what kinds of crimes exactly people are charged with. If the Florida Highway Patrol pulls you over and doesn’t accept whatever driver’s licenses you might have, you are charged for driving without a license. They can't actually charge anyone with being in the country undocumented because there's no proof of that.”
Giving context
Entering the country without inspection or illegally is a misdemeanor crime. The majority of undocumented immigrants enter the country legally, McCaffery said.
“They have some type of permission, whether it was the ability to apply for asylum or they entered with a visa,” she explained. “All of that has an expiration date. And so, a lot of people do stay past their visa, but that's not a crime either. That is an infraction, a civil infraction. Something that's like a broken contract. But that's not a crime. But they are included in the number of undocumented immigrants that we count in this country.”
There are a lot of variables for expired documents. McCaffery points to last year, when dozens of Chilean workers were laid off at ST Engineering. Renewing a visa requires going back to a home country to reapply, but that’s not easy to do when income is cut off.
“The application itself is not free,” she added. “So, in this situation where the sponsor, the employer that sponsored their visas, just dropped them with no notice, no communication afterwards, nothing; that left a lot of people vulnerable to become undocumented after a while.”
Last month, Escambia County Commissioners voted 3-2 to ratify an amended memorandum of agreement to work in partnership with ICE and assist with enforcing laws. Neighboring counties, including Okaloosa, Santa Rosa, and Walton, have signed MOAs.
Several passionate speakers shared opposition to the Escambia MOA. Commissioner Mike Kohler asked Chief William Powell, the county’s jail director, if detainees would see a judge, saying that piece was “important.” Powell said detainees are released within 72 hours if not picked up by ICE.
“I have a problem if they don’t get a judicial process,” the commissioner said.
Making a plan
The Everglades ICE detention facility, known as Alligator Alcatraz, is another cause for concern for McCaffery. Some detainees have reported worms in the food and wastewater on the floor. In July, a group of elected officials visited the site. Democrat lawmakers raised concerns about the conditions and high temperatures, while Republicans who toured said the conditions were adequate.
McCaffery worries about the mosquitoes and the possibility of diseases. She’s heard from the wife of one detainee who cannot sleep because the lights are left on 24/7. She’s heard of another detainee who had to be taken to the hospital for an emergency, and wasn’t able to contact his wife for four days.
Calls are free from the facility, McCaffery said. It’s their one lifeline to help. But since cell phones are taken away, those individuals won’t have access to contacts.
“I implore everyone to remember at least one important cell phone number (or) contact to be able to call that person if you wind up in detention,” she said.
When connecting with the local immigrant community, McCaffery strongly advises “have a plan.”
“We do ask our community to talk within the family, just like we would any other disaster plan, like we do every hurricane season, to make a plan in case of disaster,” she said. “Who's going to call whom? Who do you know that can take care of the kids if you get separated from them? What will you do if the breadwinner of your household is taken into detention? What are you going to do? And if that person winds up getting deported? What are we going to do, as a family, is the discussion that each one needs to have.”
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There have been cases when McCaffery is that contact. Just a few months ago, she got a call from a Venezuelan man who was arrested locally by FHP for driving without a license.
“I believe he had a license from Illinois,” she said. “He had no one to call but someone in the jail knew bout me and got us connected.”
McCaffery found his mother on social media, and his family was able to post bail. She got another call from him. This time from a street corner.
“He had no idea where he was. I just said ‘tell me what streets you’re on,’” she explained. “I got him in the car, got him fed, got him a hotel room. With donations from the community, we got his car (out of impound) so that he could get the heck out of here.”
If the man were arrested today, McCaffery said she doesn’t think he’d be released.
With her professional background in public relations, McCaffery couldn’t predict that her life would look as it does now. But, in a way, it makes sense.
“I think that I have a calling to help people understand each other. I mean, that is what PR work is, right?” she said.
“To help this community and anywhere that I could reach to help people understand the immigrant community, what they experience, what they've done, how they contribute, as well as the troubles they face. I guess that's why I'm here.”
