DENVER — Ahead of promised mass deportations, a Colorado group is utilizing a 24/7 hotline where people can report U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) activity in their neighborhoods.
The Colorado Rapid Response Network (CORRN) launched in 2017 and is staffed with volunteers trained to track, verify, and confirm ICE operations in the community. People who want to report an ICE incident can do so by calling 1-844-864-8341.
The group said the number of calls has ramped up this week.
"Normally, we get maybe a handful of calls a week to our hotline, and in the last three days, we've been getting dozens of calls every day," said Jennifer Piper with the Colorado Office of American Friends Committee."So far, the vast majority of them, we've been able to confirm immigration was not present. And then in a couple of cases, there's a couple cases we're not sure yet and we're investigating further."
Piper said they have about two dozen dispatchers available to answer phones in English and Spanish, and around 600 volunteers across Colorado who are trained to respond and investigate the incidents.
"There's so much misinformation and fear. We know families who are not going to school, who are afraid to go to work, and that impacts our entire community when people don't feel that they can fully participate in the life of our local communities. And we really want people to have information and to understand their rights because we believe everyone's civil and constitutional rights matter," she said.
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CORRN said the hotline is not meant to interfere with law enforcement but instead ensure the protection of people's rights.
"I think the most important thing for people to understand is that in Colorado and across the country, everyone who lives here has constitutional rights. And we believe that all law enforcement agencies should have probable cause and a warrant. And we believe that people should know their rights and be able to exercise them," Piper said. "Our volunteers are trained to ask law enforcement why they're there. Do they have a warrant? Can we see the warrant? Who is it for? If they have the legal right to be questioning someone. If they have a warrant, we're not going to stop them through the hotline, but we are going to advise people of their rights."
Even though President Donald Trump's deportation plans are focused on immigrants with criminal histories, many are worried that people with no criminal background could get caught in the crosshairs.
"I think there are a lot of us who probably wouldn't have been terribly concerned if the targets were going to only be migrants who have been convicted of some sort of a crime," said community member and advocate Dana Miller. "But we found out the other day from the head of ICE that if they go to find someone who's supposedly a criminal, and they go to someone's house and there are other undocumented people there that they will be taken, as well."
John Fabbricatore, the former field director for ICE for Colorado and Wyoming, expressed complete support for President Donald Trump's new immigration plans before a U.S. House committee on Wednesday.
"The focus should be on criminals, initially, but if you're violating the immigration law, you've violated the immigration law. You've violated laws of the United States, and at some point in time, that needs to come to a reckoning," he said.
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Miller said many immigrants have been following a legal path to citizenship.
"We all need to be keep in touch with our hearts and realize this is a country of immigrants and go out of our way to support and to protect our neighbors," she said.
Denver7 reached out to an ICE spokesperson for a statement but has not heard back as of the publication of this article.
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