The community showed up to pressure Kent County officials about sanctuary policies, but they were greeted with gaslighting and no support

Movimiento Cosecha, GR Rapid Response to ICE and other community members showed up Thursday morning to the Kent County Commission meeting to continue their efforts to push for the 6 sanctuary policies (see below) that they have been demanding over the past 12 months.

Because there was a good turnout, the Kent County Commission Chair Ben Greene conferred with legal council to limit public comment from 3 minutes to 2 minutes. This was an interesting response, especially since the whole meeting lasted less than an hour, since Movimiento Cosecha Live-streamed the meeting.

There were 21 individuals who spoke during public comment, all of which addressed the demands for Kent County to adopt the 6 sanctuary policies, with people talking about how ICE has been impacted immigrants in Kent County, along with several of the people arrested at the Sheriff’s office talking about why they risked arrest.

It was no surprise what followed after public comment. First, the County Administrator Al Vanderberg spoke for several minutes – actually he talked down to those who spoke during public comment – about why Kent County cannot address immigration policies, so while they “hear” our concerns, there is nothing they can do. Not only do people hate it when politicians gaslight them, they hate it when politicians try to avoid being held accountable.

Let’s be clear, Movimiento Cosecha and GR Rapid Response to ICE are not asking the county to adopt immigration policies, they are asking them to adopt policies that will not allow Kent County agencies, specifically the Sheriff’s office to collaborate with ICE, all for the purpose of keeping people safe. Thus, the 6 sanctuary policy demands are really public safety policies, not immigration policies.

Most of the Kent County Commissioners chose not to speak towards the end of the meeting, but there were four County Commissioners that spoke, all of which were Democrats. One said that he was going to have a conversation with the Sheriff and the other three commissioners said they “heard people” and that they think about these things, but none of them made a commitment to actually push these demands with their fellow commissioners.

The lack of interest and the action of action was palpable. However, it got me thinking. What if politicians actually listened to their constituents and showed up in community to hear directly from undocumented immigrants? How might that change their minds? What if politicians centered affected communities and ask them what they want? What if politicians actually spoke up when hearing from the community and pushed their fellow commissioners to hold hearings and craft policies that were based on what the community wants? Don’t you think that if politicians were to behave in these ways that they would actually be serving the people?

The fact of the matter is that right now those that are listening to undocumented immigrants are Cosecha and GR Rapid Response to ICE. Gema Lowe from Cosecha said during her public comment that it was the community, not the government that was keeping the immigrant community safe. We take care of each other.

The six sanctuary policies are:

• 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 county 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 from being established in Kent County, which would include the use of the Kent County Jail as a detention facility for ICE.
• A policy that will not allow the Kent County Sheriff’s Department to share Flock camera images or any other information gathered by county staff with ICE or any other law enforcement agency seeking to arrest, detain and deport immigrants.