ICE abducts Montana resident with legal humanitarian status

[Nevilledog]

https://www.thehandbasket.co/p/ice-whitefish-montana-beker-rengifo

Beker Rengifo is a 33-year-old living in Whitefish, Montana, a small city about one hour south of the Canadian border. Originally from Venezuela, he obtained legal status in the US via the CHNV humanitarian parole program which allows migrants from select countries to live here temporarily. Rengifo has become part of his community and is described by those who know him as hard-working and honest. But after a routine traffic stop on Thursday, Rengifo is now a prisoner of the federal government.

The early days of the second Trump administration have been defined by its reckless and inhumane approach to immigration issues, taking action first and asking questions later. For those not born in this country but residing here, due process has gone from a right to a luxury, as we’ve seen with the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia in Maryland and a mother and her three children in Upstate New York. So when some people in Rengifo’s community heard he’d been detained by Customs and Border Control (CBP), they sprang into action to make sure he wasn’t lost under the cover of darkness—and the opacity of immigration authorities.

“We knew that there were asylum seekers in our community who had legal status to be here in our country, and we knew that it was just a matter of time before those folks would also get picked up,” Leanette Galaz, a local community organizer who founded a group called Flathead Democracy that came Rengifo’s defense, told me Friday. She started preparing in February by creating an ICE neighborhood watch group, and it has quickly come through: As soon as group members got word Rengifo was detained, Galaz and others went right over to the local CBP building.

Galaz immediately hopped on Instagram live via the Flathead Democracy account to highlight the miscarriage of justice, and to rally people to meet at the Whitefish CBP building on Highway 93 West to raise hell. She continued broadcasting throughout the night, and from the hours of 8pm MT to 1 or 2am, 40 or so people came through in person to keep watch. They held candles and raised signs saying things like “FREE BEKER” and “No Mo’ GESTAPO” while chanting “CBP breaks the law.”

*snip*

[bucolic_frolic]

1. I think the Gestapo angle will eventually turn public opinion against ICE

The public will only deny what it can see for so long.

[LudwigPastorius]

8. The problem is, at least a third of the country is getting off on this fascist shit.

...because Trump.

[Deuxcents]

2. How many more will disappear before this ends? I know the point of this is to feel helpless

But I wish there was some direction from those who have some answers..or are there any answers?

[markodochartaigh]

7. I think that one of the main reasons

Trump is doing this is to provoke the justice system. Trump, and many of his allies, want the president to be above the other "coequal" branches of government. They are seizing people who have legitimate authority to be in the US and sending them out of the country without a hearing. This is to provoke the justice system. But once it has been made clear that the president has the power to do whatever he wants and cannot be constrained by the judicial or legislative branches, Nixon's "It's not illegal if the president does it", I think that the number of people sent out of the country will drastically increase.

[Deuxcents]

10. I'll agree but while he's provoking, real people are disappearing and our justice system is becoming torn apart

And he’s becoming more emboldened. The silence from republican leaders is deafening all because they want to be re elected. Their constituents have to join in on the protest loud n clear, for starters

[markodochartaigh]

11. Absolutely.

Real people are having their lives destroyed. We can't fail to acknowledge that. But so many districts are gerrymandered to be safe for Republicans and so few Republican voters are against what Trump is doing I think that the only way that he loses Republican votes is when he crashes the economy, and those voters won't vote Democratic they will just stay home. Of course the major constituency for Republicans is their donors. They would probably prefer to replace Trump with another Republican rather than a Democratic president though

[Deuxcents]

12. Yeah

I know about gerrymandering..my state is ruby red and no turn over in sight. Just gotta keep on keeping on

[Initech]

3. Tom Homan is a terrorist.

[dchill]

5. Never heard him open his mouth without advocating something...

... unconstitutional.

[Initech]

13. Or highly illegal.

[Ping Tung]

4. "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free" has been replaced with "No Vacancies".

[Conjuay]

6. 'No Vacancies"?

More like, "Fuck you - GET OUT!"

[Solly Mack]

9. K&R