Prof. Ana Pottratz Acosta Quoted by Star Tribune About Lack of ICE Arrest Information

Professor Ana Pottratz Acosta, visiting assistant professor and director of the the Immigration & Human Rights Clinic of the James H. Binger Center for New Americans, was quoted in the Minnesota Star Tribune about the lack of clear information about ICE arrests in the Twin Cities. Although the Department of Homeland Security says more than 400 arrests have been made since January, there is little information about the full scope of the number of people they’ve taken into custody, as well as the names of the detainees. Prof. Pottratz Acosta said one of the fundamental problems is that three Minnesota counties that have federal contracts to hold detainees do not list names on public jail logs and thus, there’s no easy way to look up the total number of people taken into immigration custody in a day. She said it’s also unlikely there will be a full picture of the number arrests until the initiative is over. Referring to the reported 400 detainees, she raised concern about whether any of the arrested were taken into custody in error and later released after they were found to be U.S. citizens. She said, “This has been promoted publicly as enforcement that’s targeting the Somali community in Minnesota, and most Somali people in Minnesota are U.S. citizens.”