Families "Are Scared To Death" After A Massive ICE Operation Swept Up Hundreds Of People
About 680 suspected undocumented workers were arrested in Mississippi in one of the largest worksite operations ever conducted by ICE agents

http://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/hamedaleaziz/ice-raid-operation-mississippi-workplace-families
Date Written:  2019-08-07
Publisher:  Buzzfeed
Year Published:  2019
Resource Type:  Article
Cx Number:  CX23775

A massive arrest of undocumented workers in Mississippi had people scrambling to care for kids whose parents were detained and traumatized the community.

Abstract: 
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Excerpt:

What the workers at the plant didn’t realize in that moment was they were about to be arrested in one of the largest worksite operations ever conducted by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. In total, some 680 suspected undocumented workers were arrested Wednesday after ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations agents swept through seven agricultural plants in the state as part of a criminal investigation. Deportation officers and HSI agents arrested the workers as they served criminal search warrants at the food plants....

Not long after Dianne's phone call with her fiancé, she found out that the kids' mother was also arrested. Dianne, who requested her last name not be used for fear of consequences for her fiancé, sped to the local school, where she witnessed other adults coming to pick up children whose parents had been arrested. Some parents, she said, weren't able to retrieve kids because they hadn’t been listed as authorized guardians.

Luis Cartagena, a pastor in Morton, Mississippi, said he witnessed ICE agents surround the local chicken processing plant. "It looked like an invasion in a war," he said, noting that there were dozens of agents, buses, and helicopters were roaming the air. Cartagena said the operation had already traumatized the Latino community.