DENVER — Nearly a week after ICE and other federal agencies conducted raids in the Denver metro, immigrant communities are still on edge, worried about what could happen next.
U.S. Senators Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper have introduced legislation in Congress to limit the locations where ICE agents can arrest people.
The Protecting Sensitive Locations Act would prevent U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) from making arrests within 1,000 feet of sensitive locations, which the bill defines as schools, churches, food pantries, healthcare facilities, bus stops, playgrounds, daycare centers, vaccination and testing sites, weddings, funerals, rallies, marches, parades and several other locations.
The legislation comes just weeks after the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) rescinded a 2021 policy that prevented ICE agents from making arrests at schools, churches, and hospitals.
“The Trump Administration’s efforts to allow ICE to take enforcement action in protected areas are deeply concerning and go against long-standing precedent,” Bennet said. “Every Coloradan should feel safe to go to school, church, and the doctor without fear of arrest.”
In rescinding the policy, DHS said federal law enforcement officers already use discretion while doing their jobs and should continue to use that discretion “along with a healthy dose of common sense.”
Raquel Lane-Arellano with the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition said Bennet and Hickenlooper’s proposal would protect innocent families.
“I think it's a really important step for public safety to make sure that there are some places in our communities where we must create a boundary and say ICE is not allowed here,” said Lane-Arellano. "We don't want ICE to be enforcing in places like hospitals or schools because it creates a real chilling effect in the community."
When ICE and other federal law enforcement agents conducted raids in the Denver area last week, there were reports of agents blocking school buses from picking up children.
A family Denver7 spoke with said they were unable to take their daughter to school because of the raid at their apartment complex.
Colorado House Speaker Julie McCluskie said her heart sank when she heard what some families had experienced.
"The fear that that instills is as damaging as anything else,” said McCluskie. "This administration says they're after violent criminals, and yet we are seeing these raids, which seem to just be fishing expeditions, don't seem to have a specific target.”
McCluskie said the raids have scared families across Colorado.
“Families that now are afraid to go into the food bank, they're afraid to get assistance when they need it. Some [are] not showing up for work, kids are not showing up for schools,” said McCluskie. “Creating this fear is unnecessary and certainly harmful to our communities.”
Colorado Congressman Gabe Evans, a former police officer, said law enforcement officers are careful when deciding whether to visit a sensitive location.
“Every time that I made a custodial arrest as a police officer, there was already a balancing act that you had to do with the threat to public safety versus the law enforcement action that needed to be taken,” said Evans. "And so, if you see arrests happening in these sensitive places, the chances are that there is a very high public safety nexus that requires that arrest to happen at a hospital, at a school."
Evans said the legislation Bennet and Hickenlooper are pushing Congress to pass could put more people in harm's way because criminals would know where to hide.
“My big concern with the bill that creates so-called sensitive spaces where you can't make an arrest is that of course, that's where your most hardcore criminals are going to congregate and look for shelter,” said Evans. “Because they know that if they can't get arrested in these places, that's going to continue to be somewhere where they have the freedom to maneuver.”
The bill makes exceptions for exigent circumstances, such as "the imminent risk of death, violence, or physical harm to any person, including a situation implicating terrorism or the national security of the United States in some other manner."
The bill says law enforcement actions at sensitive locations must cease when the exigent circumstance ends.
“We all want criminals off our streets and a more secure border,” Hickenlooper said. “Targeting kids and families who haven’t committed a crime – especially at their schools, hospitals, or places of worship – doesn’t get us any closer to fixing our broken immigration system.”
President Trump has promised to conduct the largest mass deportation program in history.
According to ABC News, the administration has started to deport more people, but much of the data remains incomplete.
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