Nov. 24—SANTA FE — New Mexico immigrant rights groups and Democratic House of Representatives Speaker Javier Martinez are calling for state laws that would protect immigrants from the mass deportations promised by President-elect Donald Trump.
On Friday, Martinez and representatives from Somos Un Pueblo Unido, El Centro de Igualdad y Derecho, Santa Fe Dreamers Project, New Mexico Immigrant Law Center and the Semilla Project at the Roundhouse announced policy proposals that would not include state resources for enforcing federal immigration laws and restricting of immigration. bar state and local governments from contracting with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for civilian immigration detention.
There are three ICE detention centers in the state, and there could be an effort to expand those detention facilities by up to 1,000 beds, said Teague Gonzalez, deputy director of programs, people and advocacy at the New Mexico Immigrant Law Center.
Mass deportations would negatively impact New Mexico’s economy by reducing the workforce in the oil and gas and agricultural industries, according to Martinez.
“If the next president deports millions of us en masse, those industries in New Mexico will not only suffer; they will implode,” Martinez said. He is an immigrant who moved to the US from Mexico at the age of seven.
There are an estimated 60,000 undocumented immigrants living in New Mexico, who pay more than $67.7 million in state and local taxes annually, said Zulema Chavero, citizenship coordinator for Somos Un Pueblo Unido. The immigrant rights movement in the state has become more robust since Trump’s first presidency, she said.
“We are gathered here today to demonstrate our strength and intent to work together to ensure that state resources and financing that we have helped generate through our labor in key industries and through our taxes are not used to increase deportations, separating families and destabilizing small businesses and local businesses. economies,” Chavero said.
On Thursday, Democratic Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham reaffirmed her previous statements on the MSNBC show “Morning Joe” that New Mexico would resist Trump’s push for mass deportations. The federal government should invest more in Border Patrol agents and stopping violent crime, she said.
“The disruption of family status and the economy, an inhumane, cruel, unfair and discriminatory policy that is illegal on its face – we are not going to participate in that effort in any way,” Lujan Grisham said.
New Mexico Republican Party Chairman Steve Pearce said Lujan Grisham should work with Trump.
“Too many lives have been taken by violent criminals and fentanyl smugglers who have taken advantage of the open border. This disregard for our citizens must end,” Pearce said in a statement.
The legislative proposals from Martinez and the immigrant rights groups include limiting the sharing of sensitive information by state employees with outside organizations to prevent driver’s license data from being shared with ICE through data brokers.
Somos Un Pueblo Unido and Focused Futures will release a report in December showing how third-party data brokers sell New Mexico information to ICE, said Marcela Diaz, executive director of Somos Un Pueblo Unido. The advocacy group is looking at how other states have tightened protections around their MVD databases so it can make recommendations to the legislature in January.
Another policy proposal is to make it easier for undocumented crime victims to obtain U visa certification. The U visa is available to certain crime survivors who are willing to cooperate with local law enforcement authorities in prosecuting the people who committed the crime. It can give someone a work permit and a path to citizenship. It requires certification, usually from local law enforcement agencies.
The proposed bill would expand the limited number of certifying entities, Gonzalez said. For example, someone staying in a domestic violence shelter can obtain a statement from the police and the shelter can conduct the certification.
“There is a difference between border security and mass deportations,” Martinez said. He charged that the majority of fentanyl brought into the country comes through legal ports of entry with U.S. citizens.
“I challenge the federal government to maybe start policing more of those big 18-wheelers coming across the border… because that’s probably where it’s coming from. Yet we’ve been made the scapegoat,” Martinez said.
