Northwest Indiana undocumented immigrants have been living in a state of uncertainty and fear amid President Donald Trump’s mass deportation orders and the state legislature’s proposed immigration House Bill 1393, area lawyers said.
Since Trump took office, Immigration and Customs Enforcement made 593 arrests on Friday and 538 on Thursday last week. Trump sent U.S. soldiers and Marines to the U.S.-Mexico border and lifted longtime rules restricting immigration enforcement near schools and churches.
Many of the ICE actions were not unusual. Similar deportation flights also took place under the Biden administration, though not using military planes. ICE averaged 311 daily arrests in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30. President Joe Biden also sent active-duty troops to the border in 2023, and numerous administrations have sent National Guard troops to assist Customs and Border Protection.
However, rumors of arrests and news reports or social media posts about the presence of agents sparked worries in communities around the country. Some rights groups launched plans to protect immigrants in the event of arrests at schools or workplaces.
Chicago Public Schools officials on Friday mistakenly believed ICE agents had come to one of their elementary schools and put out statements to that effect before learning the agents were from the Secret Service. It heightened fears among immigrant communities in the country’s third-largest city.
Gov. Mike Braun signed an executive order Tuesday that “protects the public from the threats posed by illegal aliens” in Indiana. The order offers the state’s cooperation to the federal government on immigration efforts, according to a state press release.
Under the order, state law enforcement agencies are required to fully cooperate with ICE and “to perform the functions of immigration officers in relation to the investigation, apprehension or detention of individuals illegally or unlawfully present in the United States.” Braun also encourages law enforcement officers to cooperate with ICE.
The order directs law enforcement agencies to report to the Indiana Intelligence Fusion Center credible evidence of undocumented immigrants if the person has a criminal history or is suspected of committing a felony, is suspected of engaging in “hostile activities” like espionage, or terror-related activities, or presents a significant threat to national security or public safety.
The Indiana National Guard should cooperate with requests made through the Indiana Department of Homeland Security related to immigration. The Indiana Adjutant General should report the requests and the progress of the Indiana National Guard to the governor, according to the order.
The order requires the Indiana Department of Administration and all agencies with contracting authority to require state vendors to certify their use of E-Verify to make sure their workers are lawfully permitted to work in the United States.
“Indiana will cooperate fully with the federal government, offering the assistance of the Indiana National Guard while strengthening our own efforts at home to keep illegal aliens with criminal histories out of our communities,” Braun said in the release.
House Bill 1393, authored by Rep. Garrett Bascom, R-Lawrenceburg, would allow Indiana officers to notify federal authorities after arresting people suspected of being in the country illegally.
The bill was amended in committee to state if a police officer has probable cause that an arrestee, facing a misdemeanor or felony charges, is in the country illegally then the officer must report that to the county sheriff at intake. The sheriff then has to report that information to ICE, the Capital Chronicle reported.
The amendment added probable cause as opposed to the original language requiring “reasonable suspicion,” and previously applied to people arrested for infractions, the Capital Chronicle reported.
House Bill 1393 passed out of committee and is currently being considered in the House.
Northwest Indiana immigration attorney Sophia Arshad said she has “major issues” with House Bill 1393.
If the bill became law, Arshad said there are multiple scenarios where the law could be abused and then justified. An officer would be able to ask for someone’s status based on someone’s race, ethnicity, accent or name, Arshad said.
Then, by engaging federal attorneys, undoing the arrest if someone’s due process rights were violated would be harder if the arrestee were taken by ICE or Homeland Security, Arshad said.
“It’s basically a setup for racial profiling,” Arshad said. “It’s going to take some bad factual scenarios to prove that it is unconstitutional.”
The bill sets up a case for utilizing racial profiling, which is something government agencies should avoid, Arshad said. On a deeper level, the bill challenges Trump’s push for ending Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, she said.
“The reasons they used for (ending DEI) are saying that ‘Everything needs to be equal. We’re not going to be using those initiatives. People need to be included based on their merit.’ And then on the other side of this, you’re saying, ‘Oh, but it’s OK for you to racial profile in those circumstances,’” Arshad said.
Alfredo Estrada, a Northwest Indiana immigration attorney, said it’s ironic that the Republican supermajority, which advocates for state rights and a separation on state and federal issues, has no problem going after a federal jurisdiction like immigration.
As Republican state leaders discuss immigration, Estrada said local chambers of commerce should share with them the impacts on the state’s workforce. Estrada said he’s met with various cities and talked to officials who recognize that local industries, from farms to businesses, rely on undocumented immigrants to get the job done.
“Without them, those businesses and industries don’t operate,” Estrada said. “Without them, Indiana is going to lose a lot of workforce.”
Instead, the legislature could work toward providing a driver’s license, even if it’s a separate category, to undocumented immigrants, Estrada said. Such a license would help police identify a person they may pull over for a traffic stop and allow an undocumented immigrant to get to and from work safely, he said.
Arshad said the state legislature could support immigrants through bills addressing matters from social services to identification.
The Associated Press contributed.
akukulka@post-trib.com
