Washington Week: Student Voices (O)

Student groups march in support of immigrant rights
By Jack Zeller
The Daily Cardinal, U. Wisconsin
November 18, 2008

Students protested at the Dane County Sherriff's Department because of the department's policy of reporting undomunented immagrants to the federal government.

The 75 students who represented several University of Wisconsin groups gathered Monday night. The protestors marched up State Street to the Madison City-County Building, where members of Progressive Dane were presenting an amendment to the county budget that would deny the sheriff’s department’s request for increased funds and divert the funds into area workers’ rights programs.

Despite the efforts of Progressive Dane and its supporters, the amendment did not pass and the sheriff’s department received its requested funding for 2009.

Protesters said Dane County Sheriff Dave Mahoney reports all non-U.S. citizens detained in Dane County to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a federal agency. According to Student Progressive Dane member Adam Porton, Mahoney is not obliged to do so by law and has “gone rogue.” Porton said Mahoney’s policies are used to target and intimidate immigrant communities.

“The policy has resulted in a number of long-term prison holds and deportations of individuals convicted of no crimes, but rather [who] simply have been arrested by Dane County authorities,” he said. “It’s causing an extreme culture of fear and mistrust of law enforcement in Dane County’s immigrant community.”

Porton said Mahoney’s policy also causes crimes in immigrant communities to go unreported, as fearful community members are reluctant to interact with police.

The protest included members of several UW-Madison student groups, including Student Progressive Dane, the Campus Antiwar Network, the Black Student Union, the Multicultural Student Coalition and others.

Danez Smith, public relations coordinator for the Black Student Union, said it was important that his organization be present at the protest because of the necessity for communities of color to stand in solidarity to make their voices heard.

“There’s really nothing that truly affects only one community; we’re all affected by this,” he said. “Today we’re fighting for immigration, but tomorrow we might have to fight for something that’s affecting the black community.”

The Dane County Sheriff’s Office was unavailable for comment Monday night.

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