Experts from the United Nations have expressed grave concerns that prominent human rights activists and leaders are being targeted for harassment and expulsion by their government in “a pattern of intimidation and retaliation.” That government would be the United States and its Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) force:
The Geneva-based U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said in a statement that deportation proceedings against Seattle-area activist Maru Mora-Villalpando appeared to be in retaliation for her political work.
“Giving people notice of deportation proceedings appears to be a part of an increasing pattern of intimidation and retaliation against people defending migrants’ rights in the US,” the statement said. They said people working too protect migrants’ rights must not be silenced.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials have repeatedly denied any retaliation.
Except other prominent immigrants rights leaders, including sanctuary movement leader Ravi Ragbir, have been ensnared by ICE during the past few months. Ragbir was detained during what was supposed to be a routine check-in. While he remains at risk of deportation, Ragbir was released by Judge Katherine Forrest last month, ruling that the “the government acted wrongly” and with “unnecessary cruelty” in detaining him:
Mora-Villalpando leads an organization called Northwest Detention Center Resistance, which was created in 2014 when detainees at the privately run immigration detention facility in Tacoma began a series of hunger strikes to protest their treatment.
Alejandra Gonza, director of the University of Washington’s International Human Rights Clinic, said her students helped bring Mora-Villalpando’s case to the attention of the U.N. experts.
Just weeks after Donald Trump’s inauguration last year, ICE targeted and arrested Daniela Vargas, an activist whose Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) protections had expired. Vargas had just left a press conference where she criticized deportations when she was pulled over by ICE. “You know who we are and you know why we’re here,” agents reportedly told her as they arrested her. She was eventually freed, but only after massive public outcry.
Mora-Villalpando’s advocates are hoping for a similar result. “We’re hoping this is going to pressure the U.S. government not to deport her,” Gonza said. “We’re hoping this is going to strengthen and empower Maru.”