ICE operation in Connecticut highlights how arrests are rising even in blue states

Federal immigration authorities have detained dozens of people in the city of Danbury, Connecticut, this week, despite intense opposition from elected officials and protesters.

The Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign is plowing ahead even in Democratic-led states like Connecticut that have laws seeking to limit Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s power. Nationwide, ICE arrests increased significantly in June and July, according to newly released data.

ICE officers, some wearing masks, have detained people outside Danbury apartment buildings, during traffic stops, in parks, near an elementary school, and outside a daycare center, according to the mayor and local activists tracking the operation that began Monday.

Agents detained one father who walked his child to a bus stop shortly after the school bus drove off, said Clementina Lunar, an advocate with the group Danbury Unites for Immigrants. Her group said that, as of Wednesday evening, more than 50 arrests had ripped apart 40 families, and many others were hiding in fear.

“We are talking about mothers with babies and school-age children who unfortunately had their breadwinner taken,” Lunar said. “ICE has been terrorizing” the city, she added.

Nearly one-third of the city's 90,000 people are Hispanic or Latino, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, and slightly more were born in another country.

The Department of Homeland Security said its ICE agents had addressed several “public safety threats," arresting at least four people convicted of violent crimes after entering the U.S. illegally.

Local, state and federal representatives from Connecticut held a news conference Wednesday to denounce ICE’s operation, which they said was traumatizing some young students just as they are returning to public schools.

"ICE does not target schools, but we will not allow criminals to hide in our nation’s schools and put the safety of children at risk,” the agency said.

Internal data shows ICE arrests have soared in recent months, after the agency received billions of dollars from Congress for detention and deportation and added thousands of new officers over the last year.

Nearly 50,000 people were arrested in July alone, a high for President Donald Trump’s second term, according to ICE data obtained by the Deportation Data Project based at U.C. Berkeley and UCLA and analyzed by The Associated Press. A majority of those detained had no criminal record.

While many were in Texas, Florida and other states that have enthusiastically cooperated with the crackdown, arrests increased across the country in July, even in states with laws seeking to limit ICE operations, such as New Jersey.

In Danbury, protesters have had tense confrontations with ICE officers, who responded at least once with pepper spray, according to activists.

Mayor Roberto Alves, who came to the U.S. from Brazil as a young boy, said those detained included a 30-year resident of the city who had his work authorization, was paying taxes and working toward permanent U.S. residency.

“The folks doing it the right way are also getting deported. We can’t stand for that any more,” the mayor said. “We’re fed up with what we’re seeing.”

The mayor said ICE officers appeared to be engaged in racial profiling as they targeted people in public spaces — an allegation DHS rejected as false.

During Wednesday's news conference, hecklers accused local elected officials of not doing enough to push back against ICE.

The Justice Department is challenging a Connecticut law passed this year that prohibits ICE officers from wearing masks and establishes protected areas, including schools and churches, where people cannot be arrested for civil immigration violations.

ICE argues that the law is unconstitutional, and local and state officials have said they may lack the authority to arrest federal agents.