USA: raids against illegal immigrants have begun

The operations, announced a few days ago by the president Donald Trump via Twitter, they have not been officially confirmed by the government, but by official sources unidentified by several North American media.

"I will not speak specifically about everything that is going on from the operations point of view," the director of the Immigration and Customs Service (ICE), responsible for the raids, told Fox News. Albence.

The actions have been confirmed by unidentified government spokespersons at the Wall Street Journal and CBS, CNN and NBC, among other media, according to ANSA news agencies, EFE and Europa Press.

Albence explained that the purpose of the raids is to detain "specific individuals, who have come illegally to this country, have had the opportunity to seek asylum from an immigration judge and most of them. among them have chosen not to seize this opportunity ".

Operations are conducted in Atlanta (Georgia), Baltimore (Maryland), Chicago (Illinois), Denver (Colorado), Houston (Texas), Miami (Florida), New York (New York), Los Angeles and San Francisco. (both in California)

In exchange, they are not made in New Orleans, where it was also planned to build them, as this city was hit by Tropical Storm Barry, sources said.

Raids started yesterday in New York, including Mayor Bill De Blasio, informed in press conference that there were three operations without detainees and that there had not been any today.

"That's what we know at the moment: three situations that we confirmed yesterday, in which ICE agents were involved, with witnesses who had confirmed it to us, in none of the cases did the ICE agents find out who whatever and where there was literally no activity. "De Blasio said.

According to sources quoted by the Wall Street Journal, these operations allegedly took place in the Harlem and Sunset Park neighborhoods, but ICE agents were rejected by the neighbors because they did not have an arrest warrant.

In addition, Fox News reported that a senior government official had told him that the raids had started last night in "several jurisdictions", not just in New York.

Ken Cuccinelli, acting director of the Immigration and Citizenship Service (Uscis), told CNN that he would not give "details" about the raids so as not to jeopardize the ICE agents and refused to answer if there were any guarantees that immigrant families would not be separated during operations, but warned that "there are a million people, including families, with eviction orders ".

On the other hand, Mark Morgan, Acting Commissioner of the Customs and Border Protection Bureau (CBP), said the raids were not meant to separate families because "it is not Intention has never been and will never be ". .

Cuccinelli added that the priority of the raids was to arrest violent criminals and criminals with aggravating causes, and badured that no one had been sued for illegally crossing the border, which is considered an offense.

The raids were announced Friday by Trump, after their revelation by the New York Times.

However, the president has not yet mentioned them in a series of messages that he issued today on Twitter, in which he stressed that Vice President Mike Pence's visit Friday to two detention centers for immigrants to Texas "clearly showed how well they are run and how clean they are."