Politics

Ocasio-Cortez Claims Pre-ICE-Raid Warnings Saved People

Virginia Kruta Associate Editor
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Democratic New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez claimed Monday that her warnings ahead of planned ICE raids helped “keep families together.” The example she seemed to be referencing was a teenage girl who said she wasn’t even sure it had been ICE that came to her door.

“Thanks to so many people showing up to organize this week – joining Know Your Rights canvasses and sharing information on social media – we kept a LOT of families together this weekend in the midst of ICE raids,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote in a tweet that retweets another post, including a New York Times story. “Proud of everyone who’s been stepping up to protect our neighbors.”

A teenage girl from Passaic, New Jersey, admitted that she never saw a uniform and was not able to identify the people who came to her door as ICE agents. (RELATED: Trump’s ICE Deportation Raids Reportedly Begin In New York City)

The girl’s story — which appeared in the aforementioned New York Times article published Sunday and effectively retweeted by Ocasio-Cortez — indicated that she had heard a knock at the door early Sunday morning and because of social media posts informing her of her rights, she knew not to open the door or go outside. She claimed that she believed the people at the door were ICE agents, but she admitted that none of them had identified themselves as such and she had not seen a uniform or other identifying features.

The NYT reported:

“They said, ‘We need to talk to you, can you come outside, can you open the door?’ I said, ‘Do you have permission to come inside my house, do you have a paper?’” she recounted. “They said, ‘We’re not trying to come inside your house, we just want to speak with you.’ And I said, ‘No I’m not coming outside.”

After some persistence, she said, the door-knockers left. But at 5 a.m., more arrived, now surrounding the house with flashlights and banging on the door and window. Liza ran upstairs to be with her parents, and they hid with the lights off. She said she was “too scared to look outside,” and was unable to see any uniforms the people may have been wearing. Eventually they left again.

Ocasio-Cortez had responded to the announcement of the planned ICE raids by planning canvassing meetings to help inform illegal immigrants of their rights.

According to ICE and other Trump administration officials, the planned raids were an effort to apprehend illegal immigrants who had already been afforded due process and were remaining in the country in defiance of legal deportation orders.

It has also been reported that the predicted mass ICE raids never actually materialized, at least not yet.