To the Editor:
Re “A Crackdown Sinks Children Into Lives of Fear” (front page, Feb. 5):
In Minnesota and across the country, the escalating presence and violence of immigration agents is terrorizing children. We are seeing the widespread evidence that ICE operations cause deep psychological trauma and chilling effects for both immigrant and U.S. citizen children.
In my current research, I hear from educators nationwide that ICE is raiding students’ homes, leaving teachers with crying, worried children after the disappearance of their family members. Research shows that traumas like these have long-term effects on the mental health, well-being and future opportunities of children in immigrant families.
In just the first month of 2026, the Trump administration’s attacks on our communities have left students without teachers, children without classmates and babies without parents. This greatly burdens educators, who tell me they send home food, clothes, legal resources and even their phone numbers in case their students’ caregivers are abducted.
For the sake of our kids, this must stop. We want immigration agents out of our communities. Congress must refuse additional taxpayer funding to ICE and make real budget cuts to this harmful, deadly agency. It must hold the administration accountable for its lawlessness and invest in the safety and well-being of all children and families.
Sophia Rodriguez New York The writer is an associate professor of educational leadership and policy studies in the Steinhardt School at New York University.
To the Editor:
How can this ICE campaign of terror be going on in the United States of America? It’s beyond belief, but it’s happening, and children are paying a heavy price.
Congress must put an end to this now; there can be no waiting for the next election. Since congressional Republicans seem to have lost their consciences, Democrats must take the lead in disempowering ICE.
In doing so, it might help to emphasize that the issue of immigration is really two issues. One involves our policy going forward: how we plan to secure our borders, determine who can enter the country and vet people wishing to move here. Democrats should indicate a greater willingness to negotiate about those things.
But the second issue involves migrants who, by whatever means, have already entered the United States and built lives and families here. Unless they are criminals, they must be left alone! Trying to retroactively correct perceived immigration policy lapses of the past leads to the inhumanity that we are seeing.
Vicki Riba Koestler Alexandria, Va.
To the Editor:
Re “Judge Allows Policy Restricting Lawmakers’ Access to ICE Facilities” (news article, nytimes.com, Jan. 19):
We visited an ICE facility in upstate New York in January to meet with detained people in need of legal assistance. What we heard there was disturbing.
The detained immigrants we met described dangerous conditions and inhumane overcrowding. People told us that before we arrived, the gym we were using for legal presentations had been used as overflow “housing.”
People slept shoulder to shoulder on gym mats, with one bathroom for around 40 men, and no shower access. The men detailed how they were forced to brush their teeth and wash up with the water from right above the toilet.
In such conditions, sickness spread rampantly. One man we spoke with showed us welts all over his body because of the conditions he had been living in for months. Other people told us they had spent months in solitary confinement in retaliation for calling out officers’ mistreatment.
As immigration advocates, we know that stories like these aren’t unique. ICE facilities nationwide are notorious for abuse, overcrowding and neglect.
The reality of what takes place in these facilities is hard to comprehend from the outside, and that dissociation is deliberate. We need whistle-blowers monitoring conditions. We need in-person, unannounced visits to hold ICE accountable, and to sound the alarm when basic needs — and basic humanity — are not met.
“Out of sight, out of mind” is not a neutral condition; it is a choice. And it is a choice we cannot afford to make when human lives are on the line.
Danielle McClain Aimee Howard Washington The writers work with the U.S. legal team at the Robert & Ethel Kennedy Human Rights Center.
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