Voces de la Frontera Continues to Fight for Immigrant Communities: The Detentions Continue (Part 1 of 2)
The staff and volunteers of Voces de la Frontera’s Madison office: Pablo Ortiz, Karen Romo, Iris Christensen, Itzhel Velazquez Rubio, and Luis Velasquez.
by Jonathan Gramling
At the beginning of 2026, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, was aggressively rounding up immigrants in Minneapolis wearing masks. They were almost like an occupying army, often ignoring people’s rights. While the Trump administration stated that they were rounding up immigrants with criminal records, in fact the vast majority had no records. It seemed that ICE’s approach was to round up everyone “who looked foreign” and sort it out later. Two Minneapolis citizens were killed by ICE agents and many more injured.
This very visible approach began to turn the majority Americans against the Trump administration’s aggressive approach. A change in ICE’s leadership was made and it appeared that fewer visible confrontations were occurring. The issue of ICE enforcement seemed to fade from the media spotlight and a sense of quiet occurred. But the detentions and ICE raids continued, especially in areas of Wisconsin where the county sheriff was cooperating with ICE.
“There has been a significant increase of detentions here in Wisconsin during the summertime,” Luis Velasquez, who coordinates the work of Voces de la Frontera in South Central Wisconsin. “It is quiet, but not so quiet for immigrant communities. There was recent data that came out that confirmed what we already know because we have the hotline and are able to gauge the temperature of where things are at. I think it was WPR that released an article in the last week that confirmed that 70 percent of the detentions are happening through jails or detention centers in the counties. We know there are 23 counties currently who are working with 27g, which is a cooperation agreement between the sheriff and ICE. Dane County is not one of them. But that is why things appear to be quiet. Detentions are happening because of these collaborations. It is easier to pick folks up if someone is detained because they are not driving with their license. We just had a case in Sauk County where someone was detained. They didn’t have a driver’s license. It was their first time. And then ICE put a hold on them. That’s why it sounds like it is quiet because in part, that’s the strategy.”
But there have also been some very visible raids, especially in counties not cooperating with ICE.
“At the end of June, we were able to corroborate at least 11 detentions here in Dane County on June 30th,” Velasquez said. “And then in Milwaukee, it started a bit earlier. It was a multi-day operation by ICE enforcement. That means ICE was in the streets. ICE was at people’s homes. In Milwaukee, there were about 39 detentions. Rock County had 27 detentions that we were able to corroborate.”
Voces is committed to supporting immigrants in a number of ways. ICE agents are not necessarily well-trained or experienced, especially those who have been recently hired through the Trump administration’s rapid build-up of ICE. Voces is working to ensure people’s rights are respected.
“There is a case in Milwaukee,” Velasquez said. “It’s a public case. It’s a couple of immigrant folks from Nicaragua. Basically ICE agents were very forceful and aggressive. That also happened at the laundromat here in Madison. So Voces has been focused on those kinds of cases where there is a clear constitutional violation. There are at least three cases that are public now. All of these families have an attorney. But things are very difficult for many reasons. Right now with one case in Milwaukee, ICE is alleging that she was violent. She was insistent in obstructing. And so it becomes very complicated because A) They are moving folks who are detained to other states. That makes it harder to find an attorney and to find support. B) They are making allegations of obstruction.”
For many immigrants, they are damned if they follow the law and damned if they don’t. It’s very much a Catch 22 situation.
“On June 30th when ICE was here in the morning, they were making targeted detentions,” Velasquez said. “But we know that the folks who called the hotline, most of them didn’t have any kind of criminal record. They are detaining folks who are not going to their ICE check-ins. Folks who are stuck in that system are too afraid. ‘If I go, I’ll be detained. If I don’t, I’m at risk of being detained.’ So we know they are targeting folks who have not gone to their ICE check-ins, who have avoided the process. We know that they are law-abiding persons who are looking for a way to become U.S. citizens. They have followed the process. They have petitioned for asylum. Most of the cases that we have here in Dane County are folks who are asylum seekers. And there are some folks who have gone to their appointments and suddenly ICE is targeting them.”
The ICE methodology on who is detained by ICE is very confusing to Voces and others. There doesn’t seem to be rhyme or reason to it.
“The laundromat situation here in Madison was a person who didn’t have any type of crime,” Velasquez said. “There is confusion. Why was this person targeted? There are lots of incidents of ICE going to a place looking for José, but then they take Mario. There is a lot of that going on. They will make an excuse, but then take anyone. It’s very confusing because we know for a fact that the folks they are detaining don’t have any type of criminal record because it’s easy to check on CCAP. The laundromats were targeted because there were other folks there. That’s what we try to understand. What’s happening? There were other folks around. It wasn’t, ‘Let’s detain everyone at the laundromat.’ They went after someone and we don’t exactly why. We were able to go through the person’s background and there were no red flags. We’re stuck with why that person and why not others.”
And ironically, the seemingly haphazard approach to enforcement, actually allows some crimes to increase.
“These programs like 27g are making people more afraid to report crimes,” Vasquez said. “That’s the opposite of what we would like to see. We would like to have public safety. We want people to reach out if there is a need. When we have also seen through the hotline is folks who are afraid to report crime. Even here in Dane County, we’ve been sharing what the sheriff has shared, what the chief of police has shared that they are not going to collaborate with ICE. But there is the perception that community members have. There is the sense of mistrust. That mistrust has been there for a long time. But it has gotten worse in that people don’t want to report out crimes. They feel afraid.”