Democrat Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL) of Chicago was detained when he refused to leave a meeting of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Gutierrez became belligerent and refused to exit until ICE met his demands. He was leading a “sit-in” with illegal aliens who wanted to know details about deportation rules. Gutierrez didn’t think ICE was giving him enough information, so he refused to leave.
That’s when he was handcuffed, as NBC 5 Chicago reported:
Specific immigration cases discussed in the meeting included the pending deportations of Army veteran Miguel Perez Jr., according to Rivlin, as well as Francisca Lino, whose husband and four of her six children are U.S. citizens.
“The congressman first met with the same ICE regional director in 2008 about this case, about getting a deferral from deportation,” Rivlin said. “Ms. Lino came in regularly for meetings with ICE every year as a condition for her deferred deportation, and a couple of weeks ago she was told that she would need to get her bags together and has a specific date for when she is going to be deported in July. The congressman is asking that that deportation be canceled.”
“The congressman said this is reprehensible that immigrants are being treated this way, that the rules are changed without any information or notice, that low priorities for deportation are being removed from the country and the congressman wants to get answers from the staff here, and he has not been getting any answers,” Rivlin continued. “They need to call Washington, they need to call the White House.”
“This is the same situation that we had when there were people arriving at the airports and they couldn’t get information out of CIS and ICE officials about how they were being treated,” Rivlin said, referring to the rollout of President Trump’s Jan. 27 executive order halting refugee resettlement and suspending entry of immigrants from seven Muslim-majority nations for 90 days.
As an ICE official said:
Federal Protective Service officers were called by ERO to the scene because the individuals would not leave the ERO office. FPS provided three separate verbal warnings and after each warning FPS provided the individuals several minutes to comply. When the group refused to leave, they were briefly placed in flexible plastic restraints before ICE officials relayed that they no longer wanted the individuals removed from the building. The Congressman and other individuals were placed in the restraints for approximately two minutes before the flex cuffs were removed by FPS. FPS did not cite these individuals.
Here are photos from the arrest:
Federal police giving us our first warning that we risk arrest if we stay at Chicago ICE HQ.#chiresist #twill pic.twitter.com/M77rU0EgGs
— Luis V. Gutierrez (@RepGutierrez) March 13, 2017
I was arrested, cuffed then cuffs were cut off. Waiting for further word on if/when we will be arrested. #chiresist pic.twitter.com/vKJRnz6Ebj
— Luis V. Gutierrez (@RepGutierrez) March 13, 2017
This is a cheap political stunt by a far-left member of Congress who doesn’t want President Trump’s administration to enforce the law. But the new travel restrictions and ICE rules are there to keep America safe.
What do you think about Rep. Luis Gutierrez’s protest? Please leave us a comment (below) and tell us.
