Cosecha and GR Rapid Response to ICE once again pressure Grand Rapids City officials to declare the city a Sanctuary

Last night, several members of Movimiento Cosecha and GR Rapid Response to ICE came to the Commissioner’s night out, which was held at Union High School. 

Since it was a Commissioner’s night out, the doors opened at 5pm, where people could access city services, get information and have more formal conversations with commissioners and city staff. Movimiento Cosecha members came early to hand out information on their upcoming May Day actions, but they also brought some political theater.

Cosecha made a pinata, with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) symbol on it and invited people to whack the ICE pinata. Ironically, even Commissioner Belchak decided to whack the ICE pinata.  Members of Movimiento Cosecha had attempted to bring the ICE pinata inside, since it was cold last night, but city workers, security and cops would not allow it. 

The regular City Commission began at 7pm and Cosecha and GR Rapid Response to ICE member were expecting to speak during the public comment at the end of the meeting, since immigration and sanctuary matters were not on the agenda. However, for some reason, the City decided that there would be no public comment at the end, thus people who attended the meeting were invited to speak during the first public comment period, even before the Commission got to their agenda.

Beginning at about 15 minutes in the video, you can hear people speak about the importance of the City of Grand Rapids adopt a sanctuary policy. In fact, most of the comments made during the public comment period centered on Grand Rapids becoming a Sanctuary City.

Movimiento Cosecha had sent out a Media Advisory earlier in the day, which I am going to include here, since it provides clear talking points about GR becoming a Sanctuary City, along with responses to previous comments from Mayor LaGrand and Comissioner Belchak.

Mayor LaGrand you said in January that being a Sanctuary City would give immigrants a “False sense of Hope”. We disagree, it would mean a concrete commitment that the City would not cooperate with ICE in the following ways: 

• policies restricting the ability of state and local police to make arrests for federal immigration violations, or to detain individuals on civil immigration warrants;
• policies restricting the police or other city workers from asking about immigration status;
• policies prohibiting “287(g)” agreements through which ICE deputizes local law enforcement officers to enforce federal immigration law;
• policies that prevent local governments from entering into a contract with the federal government to hold immigrants in detention;
• policies preventing immigration detention centers in Grand Rapids.
• GRPD will not arrest people who GR Rapid Response to ICE mobilizes to prevent ICE from arresting and detaining members of the immigrant community.

Adopting these policies would not give people false hope, but provide concrete acts of solidarity and support to the undocumented community. 

Commissioner Belchak said in January, when we first asked Grand Rapids to declare itself a Sanctuary that “we not have heard from people who oppose it. As of right now, we know that 3204 people to have signed on the demand that the City become a Sanctuary, while only 16 people have publicly opposed it, based on direct communication with the City of Grand Rapids since January.

Grand Rapids has also said they don’t want to lose state or federal funds by being a Sanctuary. We believe that if the State or Federal government cut funds to Grand Rapids for standing in solidarity with immigrants that 2 things would happen: 1)People would be angered and moved to action against the Federal or State government for being so petty; and 2) people would step up with funds, skills or whatever they could to make sure that people’s needs were being taken care of despite funding being withheld. In addition, the City of Grand Rapids could do what the cities of Chelsea and Somerville, Massachusetts did, which is to sue the Trump Administration for their efforts to coerce them into participating in mass deportation. 

Right after someone read these comments, people with Movimiento Cosecha and GR Rapid Response to ICE stood up and began chanting, engaging in a disruptive action, which begins at 55:40 into the video. The disruption only lasted for about 5 minutes before the Mayor called in security and GRPD to escort people out of the building.