Philadelphia’s local government has stated that it will end its long-term information-sharing contract with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency after weeks of protests and backlash regarding ICE’s recent actions at the U.S.-Mexico border.
The contract’s termination will exempt the city from providing real-time arrest information with the agency, a procedure that has been followed for over a decade. The measure will be fully removed from Philadelphia’s legislation at the end of August.
The measure was called Preliminary Arraignment Reporting System (PARS) and informed ICE officials when new arrests were made, alongside with substantial information about the subjects, such as their names and their countries of origin. Democrats have long argued that ICE has abused the system and advocated for the investigation of potential immigration violations.
Philadelphia’s Mayor, Jim Kenney, stated:
I cannot in good conscience allow the agreement to continue.We’re not going to provide them with information so they can go out and round people up. If I could abolish ICE, I would. But we can abolish this contract, and we are.”
Kenney supports the theory that ICE uses PARS to their convenience, tracking people who state that they are from other countries and subsequently going to their homes and workplaces. This policy affects mainly undocumented immigrants who haven’t committed any crime besides the way they entered the United States.
