Do we really want to live like this?
The clip below (from Portland) has eaten at me ever since I first saw it. Overnight we’ve become a country where masked men in unmarked vehicles can jump out and demand to see your proof of citizenship. Don’t have it? Zip ties, handcuffs, jail. Guilty until proven innocent. Your Fourth Amendment protection from the unreasonable search and seizure of your person is gone. Just like for California-born Francisco Miranda:
A Milwaukie, Oregon, resident claims that he was “forcibly abducted” by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers and held at the Portland ICE facility for several hours, despite being a U.S. citizen. The incident was first reported by Willamette Week.
Francisco Miranda, who was born in California, sent a tort claim to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem through his attorney on Monday, less than a week after his Oct. 2 arrest outside his workplace in Northeast Portland.
A tort is a wrongful act or a violation of someone’s rights that is not part of a contract and can cause harm, leading to civil legal responsibility.
The arrest comes as more U.S. citizens report being arrested or detained by ICE, though this appears to be one of the first such cases in Oregon.
The video eats at Mehdi Hasan for the same reason:
Do most Americans really want to live in a country like this? Treated like this by masked agents of the president’s violent secret police?
Also, the worst ICE agents are the Latino guys, sorry, but shame on them.
Are you a teen on a bicycle? You are a target too.
Or a 15-year-old girl?
How many of you could “prove” your citizenship on demand to avoid being handcuffed and detained for hours or even days?
Some months back I checked my birth certificate for the very hospital I was born. Not that any of these ICEmen would care to examine it if I were dark-skinned enough for them to look at me sidewise.
We don’t see what’s going on with the 15-year-old teenage boys after the “agent” claims he’s going to “do facial” (recognition) to verify one kid’s identity. Or is that just an intimidation tactic? If not why didn’t the agents in Miranda’s case do the same instead of hauling him to jail? The Highway Patrol can verify your identity from the front seat of their cruisers. If Miranda is a duly registered Oregon voter (a citizen), agents could verify that with a web search of the state’s database. Or are they just in a rush to make quota?
All of this is as insane as our president is addled.
Now of course the Trump administration will scream that using the image at the top of Nazis inspecting a man’s “papers” is inflammatory and puts agents at risk. But that is a sloppy attempt to silence dissent. Fascists are like racists that way. They hate being tagged with name, just not enough to reconsider behaviors that inspire the comparison.
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Is this a private fight, or can anyone join?
No King’s One Million Rising movement – Next national day of protest Oct. 18
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Freedom Over Fascism Toolkit
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Indivisible: A Guide to Democracy on the Brink
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Chop Wood, Carry Water
Thirty lonely but beautiful actions
Attending a Protest Surveillance Self-Defense