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As immigration enforcement ramps up across the country, so do rapid response networks, a web of community members and lawyers who volunteer to activate legal support and verify Immigration and Customs Enforcement sightings.
But the hotline isn’t a new concept – the San Mateo County Rapid Response Network was the first in 2016 to emerge in the country, said a representative from the local network Nani Friedman.
During President Donald Trump’s first term in office, leaders with local nonprofit Faith in Action Bay Area began brainstorming ways to address immigration fears in the community, Friedman said. Residents and leaders wondered what information they could have used in moments encountering ICE.
“They came up with this concept of the rapid response hotline so that people wouldn’t feel alone,” Friedman said.
As immigration fears rise following two targeted East Palo Alto arrests from the federal agency, local experts and lawyers advise reaching out to rapid response teams and avoiding unverified social media posting.
Not all hotlines follow the same model, but Santa Clara and San Mateo County networks are robust and offer wraparound services like 24/7 legal support and verification assistance. Calling a hotline is the first step any resident should take if they suspect local immigration enforcement, said Alison Kamhi, Legal Program Director for the Immigrant Legal Resource Center.
“One of the best things that I feel like we can all do is really cut through the noise to make sure that folks know what are actual threats and what are rumors,” Kamhi said, in an interview with this publication.
Many local reported sightings have turned out to be undercover police or SWAT activity. San Mateo County rapid response staff have not confirmed any immigration “raids” at local worksites nor random arrests of people on the street.
“We see the panic and the terror that our community is experiencing, which means that there is a lot of fear and misinformation spreading really quickly, especially through social media, text messages, WhatsApp messages,” Friedman said.
Unverified sightings have the potential to affect people’s living conditions and health, she said.
“It affects their economic life, whether they’re able to go to work,” Friedman said. “It affects their ability to pay bills. It affects their physical health and their mental health.”
In cases people do believe they are encountering federal agents, experts advise them to remain silent and take videos for documentation purposes.
But even if residents can confirm an ICE sighting, they should avoid posting videos of arrests without speaking to legal experts or the person in the video.
“Videos of people’s ICE arrest can negatively harm their legal case,” said Friedman, who added that it could cause more “trauma” for individuals.
If people are interested in assisting with local efforts to document ICE sightings or assist with immigration cases, they can sign up to volunteer with their county rapid response team or donate to funds supporting legal representation for people who were arrested.
San Mateo and Santa Clara counties partner with their local rapid response networks to help pay for legal consultations and immigration attorneys, who can help people begin a process of being released, Friedman said, but it is difficult to secure long-term free legal assistance for all.
“We are in a heightened and aggressive enforcement climate, and there is absolutely heightened fear,” Kamhi said. “We are seeing arrests in places that we didn’t see before, such as immigration courts. And folks have been incredibly creative and innovative about how to respond, challenging actions in the courts and also by protests.”
In Redwood City and Palo Alto, community members have hosted protests in response to East Palo Alto immigration arrests that left one woman hospitalized and discharged before she was healthy.
Hours within Aleyda Rodriguez’s arrest, rapid response networks were able to verify her arrest and get in contact with her family.
“If there were to be an ICE detention, the vision is that the community would be able to respond, immediately be able to get in contact with legal support and be able to walk with that family through such a challenging time because there is just this sense that when this happened before, people were all alone,” Friedman said.
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Nice article, but why didn’t you include the hotline numbers? That would have been the most useful thing.