Портал для сообщений о действиях ICE в округе Монтгомери получил более 600 заявлений, большинство из которых оказались ложными

Montgomery County’s portal for reporting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) activities has received more than 600 submissions since its launch on July 8, officials told Bethesda Today in an interview on Monday. As of Monday morning, county spokesperson Luisa Cardona told Bethesda Today, the county had received 623 submissions through the ICE reporting portal. However, that number may not represent the actual number of ICE operations observed in the county. A majority of the early submissions — approximately three-quarters of the first 475, according to county Assistant Chief Administrative Officer Earl Stoddard — were false reports from people voicing opposition to the county’s immigration policies. Of the 475 first reports, Stoddard said, officials believe 122 were made in good faith. However, he conceded, “we’re not calling ICE” about every reported enforcement action. Over the past year, the county has adopted several new laws in response to the federal government’s ramped-up immigration enforcement efforts. Among them were a law to prohibit mask-wearing by law enforcement agents while on duty and a law to ban privately-owned immigration detention centers in the county. The ICE reporting portal was a product of the County Values Act, which prohibits ICE from using county-owned garages, parking areas and vacant lots as staging areas for immigration enforcement actions. Through the portal, officials hope to track violations of the County Values Act and other immigration-related laws. Since the initial wave of false reports, Stoddard told Bethesda Today, the portal has netted four or five legitimate reports daily. County officials often see multiple reports containing new information about the same immigration enforcement action, Stoddard said, which can be helpful in piecing together what happened. The portal has also corroborated what county officials knew anecdotally about where ICE is most often operating in the county. A high volume of reports have come from Gaithersburg; Takoma Park along the border with Washington, D.C.; Silver Spring’s Georgia Avenue corridor; and along the scenic Clara Barton Parkway, where U.S. Park Police have been assisting with immigration enforcement, Stoddard said. Lowe’s and Home Depot locations throughout the county are also hot spots. Stoddard emphasized that the areas with the most ICE activity are subject to change. “We don’t want to create a false sense of comfort or hope that an area won’t be impacted,” he said. According to Cardona, people who submit reports through the portal rarely provide their contact information. Because all of the reports have been submitted in English, Cardona said, officials believe most have come from allies of the immigrant community rather than people who have been detained by ICE and their household members. In an interview on Tuesday, Council President Natali Fani-González (D-Dist. 6) told Bethesda Today the lack of reports in languages other than English is not necessarily a sign that immigrants are not using the portal. “Spanish is my native language, but if I have to file a report I automatically do it in English,” Fani-González said. She added that she has appeared on Spanish-language TV and radio stations to promote the portal to Hispanic and Latino county residents. Another trend seen in responses to the county’s portal has been the targeting of construction crews working on home renovation projects, Stoddard said. The immigrant rights organization We Are CASA decried this practice in a Tuesday press release responding to recent ICE operations in Maryland and Virginia that led to the arrests of 1,328 people between Aug. 1 and 14. It is not clear how many of those were in Montgomery County. “Ripping working families apart is a devastating misallocation of taxpayer resources that leaves our entire region less protected,” We Are Casa wrote in the release. “The real threat to our communities is the lawlessness with which ICE operates as agents racially profile and violently arrest everyday workers.” We Are CASA did not immediately respond to questions from Bethesda Today about whether the group has been using the county’s ICE reporting portal or promoting it within the immigrant communities it serves. According to Stoddard, county officials expect to publicly release aggregated data on ICE enforcement actions at the end of the quarter. The information will first be reviewed by the County Council, he said. Ultimately, Cardona said, the portal is a way for county officials to collect data and respond effectively to high-profile immigration enforcement actions. People seeking resources for those impacted by detention and deportation should instead contact the county’s Gilchrist Immigrant Resource Center. “The portal should not be that primary gateway,” Cardona said.