Julia Chavez cried thinking about her daughter Anah’s seventh birthday party on Sunday.
While her friends from Caledonia Elementary School were there, Anah’s cousins and extended family who live in Jackson missed the celebration.
They were too scared to make the drive.
Even with birthright citizenship status, Chavez said none of them wanted to risk being stopped, questioned and possibly detained by U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement on the drive up from Jackson just for being Hispanic.
“(They sent) these beautiful messages, but I already knew, and I told them, ‘You don’t have to explain. … We know what’s going on,’” Chavez told The Dispatch.
Since 2024, Chavez said her fears – and the concerns of many other Hispanic community members in the Golden Triangle – have heightened as ICE’s enforcement grows increasingly antagonistic against Hispanic people across the country, as they see it.
Those fears compounded when Chavez heard about Senate Bill 2114, which requires local sheriff’s offices to enter into written agreements with ICE’s 287(g) program by Oct. 1, allowing them to enforce immigration to a greater degree while creating a more direct tie between federal and local agencies.
Different versions of the bill passed the House and Senate along party lines, with the current version headed to Gov. Tate Reeves’ desk after passing conference committees Tuesday.
District 43 Rep. Rob Roberson, R-Starkville, said he supported the legislation because ICE and local law enforcement already coordinate regularly when needed.
“I don’t really understand what the huge controversy was behind it, other than the fact that immigration has become such a political hot potato these days,” Roberson said. “… I mean, the bottom line is federal agencies and state agencies are supposed to work together.”
District 41 Rep. Kabir Karriem, D-Columbus, opposed the legislation out of concern that a more direct tie between local law enforcement agencies and ICE will lead to a significant growth in racial profiling and issues of mass incarceration in Mississippi.
“It also puts a strain on local law enforcement and its resources, and let alone (talking) about the burdens it’s going to put on taxpayers,” Karriem said.
Chavez said she is frustrated that both chambers passed the legislation without giving more consideration to the negative impacts it could have for Hispanic residents like her and her family.
“The legislature, they don’t care about racial profiling and how it will affect my children, or how it will affect me when I’m going and doing about daily activities, and … (how) it will affect our daily lives,” she said.
‘We’ve got enough on our plate as it is’
The 287(g) program, which has been voluntary for local law enforcement agencies across the country up to this point, has three models, ICE’s website said.
Under the task force model, partner agencies receive immigration enforcement training and can make immigration arrests during their regular duties. Agencies under the warrant service officer model can serve and execute arrest warrants on undocumented immigrants in their custody.
Through the program’s jail enforcement model, local officers investigate the immigration status of individuals only after they’ve been arrested, then they alert ICE for processing.
While Clay County Sheriff Eddie Scott, Lowndes County Sheriff Eddie Hawkins and Oktibbeha County Sheriff Shank Phelps agreed illegal immigration is not a major concern in the Golden Triangle, each of the three agencies already alert ICE when an undocumented immigrant is arrested for a crime.
Hawkins said his office, at most, deals with no more than two of those arrests each month.
“We’re not going out here looking for undocumented aliens,” Hawkins said. “When we run across somebody who’s committed a crime (and they are undocumented), then we deal with it.”
While Scott and Phelps said they need to better research the ICE program models, both lean toward the jailing model for their respective agencies.
Scott said his office does not have the resources to perform additional immigration enforcement duties alongside its routine responses.
“Sheriff’s offices as a whole … in Mississippi, we don’t have the manpower or the time to be going out here doing this kind of stuff,” Scott said. “I mean, if (ICE) comes in to do an operation, we’ll assist them. But as far as going out, (and) … looking for and serving warrants, we don’t have the time for that, we’ve got enough on our plate as it is.”
Though Hawkins isn’t sure which model his office will go with if Reeves signs the bill into law, he said he doesn’t expect community trust to change much since it’s already known LCSO cooperates with ICE.
“I don’t know if there’s (been) any outcry about us calling ICE when we find somebody that’s committed a crime and they’re undocumented,” Hawkins said.
Carol Armstrong, an immigration attorney with offices in Starkville, as well Huntsville and Tuscaloosa, Alabama, said that may not necessarily be the case.
“How many people, educated or otherwise, are really going to understand which model (their sheriff’s department is) choosing?” Armstrong said. “All people are going to hear is, ‘Hey, our local (police department) or our local sheriff is going to help ICE round up all those (undocumented immigrants).’
“… And who’s to say they choose one and that’s what they actually do,” she added “… I see it in communities now where the 287(g) program is in effect, and I see circumstances where cops are pulling people over based on the way they look, and that’s scary.”
Feeling unsafe
Chavez fears that kind of racial profiling every time she or her family travels.
“I still have the fear, (and) I don’t think necessarily the immigration status has anything to do with it,” Chavez said. “Even if you have your papers or you don’t, my husband has his citizenship, and he still has the fear.”
A Hispanic man living in Lowndes County, who spoke to The Dispatch anonymously out of fear of reprisal due to his undocumented status, said he doesn’t travel outside the county. He said he lives in fear of being questioned for his immigration status by law enforcement.
“(I travel) to my job, my home, Walmart maybe to buy something to eat. That’s it,” he said. “I don’t want a problem, (but) have a problem because I don’t know, maybe next year I’m working and ICE catches me.”
The man wasn’t aware of the law before this week and is now concerned about heavier immigration enforcement in the Golden Triangle, similar to what he has heard about in other places like Minneapolis or even Tupelo.
Chavez called the legislation a “slap in the face” from both lawmakers and community members in support of the increased enforcement.
“(Hispanic locals) try so hard, and we give so much to the community, and just for the legislature to look at us like we’re nothing,” Chavez said. “… (It is) like you don’t care about us, like we’re nobody.”
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You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 39 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.
