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Dear John, Many people mistakenly believe that the role of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is confined to border enforcement. But in the summer of 2020, CBP officers were deployed alongside local law enforcement to police those participating in protests far from the border demanding racial justice. As the Council and our partners the Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI) found in a report, CBP overstepped its mandate and became involved in policing these protests, often without first consulting city and state authorities. Through our litigation, we secured documents from CBP that showed top officials were concerned that its agents weren’t trained to interact with protestors, and initially did not know that CBP agents had arrested protestors in unmarked vans.
The Council’s transparency team is in Cape Town, South Africa this week at the 6th World Conference on Remedies to Racial and Social Inequality, presenting alongside BAJI about our work to promote greater accountability and transparency around CBP. What happened in 2020 could be a model for how federal law enforcement is deployed in the future. That’s why we’re using the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to keep policymakers and the public informed about CBP’s role in policing beyond the border. Sincerely, Raul Pinto |
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