Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings said he would be willing to reexamine the agreement between the county jail and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement that allows ICE agents to take away and detain Orange County Jail inmates suspected of being in the country illegally.
The issue came up after dozens of Orange County residents spoke out during Tuesday morning’s Board of County Commissioners meeting.
“You swore to defend the Constitution of the U.S. You have the power to do so in this case,” said Ericka Gomez-Tejeda. “It is in your hands to change the language and the various contracts with ICE to ensure the tracking of due process, which in immigration varies case by case, and to track the whereabouts of immigrants held. The feds have been carelessly getting the process wrong.”
Gomez-Tejeda said the current database of detained suspects doesn’t show if due process rights are being met or where inmates are being taken.
“Until that database can be a source, a trusted source, we should not be complicit in allowing people to just disappear into nothingness, especially when we're housing them in our own jail,” said Gomez-Tejeda, an organizing director at Hope Community Center, a service that provides help to immigrants and working communities.
The organization is one of 30 grassroots groups that make up the Immigrants Are Welcome Here Coalition.
“We're not asking for them to have compassion on immigrants, said Jen Hall, a co-leader of the Orlando 50-50-1 Latino group and part of the coalition. “We're asking them to do their duty as representatives of Orange County, and regardless of our relation with them, we will continue to ask them to do our job, to represent us, and until it does, we will not be silenced.”
Earlier in March, Orange County commissioners voted to approve an agreement with ICE, 5-2.
Under the agreement, 17 county jail staffers would be trained by ICE to serve as warrant service officers to detain and turn over inmates who the agency accuses of being in the country illegally.
Although Demings said the county would be willing to bring up the issue of the agreement again, he defended the commissioners’ March approval.
“You all know that those are federal issues. There are times when individuals are booked into the Orange County Jail who are detainees under federal law,” Demings said. “There are federal laws that do prohibit some disclosure of information, while they are in our custody, they are providing information about their due process, but that due process is within the federal system, not within the local Orange County system.”
However, Isaie Marc, a director of Unite Here Local 737 and member of the coalition, is not convinced.
“He says the ball is not in his hand. I believe that, yes, that's partial, true, but I believe he can do more,” he said.
Marc immigrated to America 26 years ago from Haiti. He’s concerned about the upcoming termination of the temporary protection status (TPS) that many Haitians and Venezuelans use to call Central Florida their home.
“There are thousands of Haitians, thousands of Venezuelans who live in fear right now. So this issue is home for me... We want to fight for due process for everyone,” he said.
TPS is expected to end in July.
Appealing to Demings to reconsider the ICE agreement was District 5 Commissioner Kelly Semrad. She and District 1 Commissioner Nicole Wilson were the dissenting votes in the March approval of the agreement. Semrad said she has been to the jail and heard from workers as well as received calls from families who have lost track of family members taken by ICE.
“We voted through because we felt compelled to comply with state law. But you know what? I'm not afraid to be removed if I'm going to stand with all of these people and hold up the American flag and wave and demand due process,” Semrad said through tears.
“Let's bring this back to the board. Let's talk about it, and let's figure out if there's anything we can do to make it a little better. And you know what? We might have to say, there's nothing we can do. It might come down to that, but at least we fought with them.”
Demings agreed that the board would take up the issue again, but he did not specify a date.
