Skip to content

Featured Tag: Immigration enforcement

Community Readiness in the Face of ICE Arrests

President Trump campaigned on a threat to deport one million immigrants from this country per year.  We saw an ongoing escalation of the numbers of immigrants targeted in Massachusetts throughout 2025 and continuing into early this year, but still well below deporting one million people.  However, this is beginning to change. Over this past year … Continued

Back to School: What Immigrant Families Should Know

As immigration enforcement increases across the country and protections such as Temporary Protected Status end for some countries, many immigrant families are living with fear and uncertainty. That fear is affecting whether some children make it to school. Recent data show that 17% of parents cited ICE activity near schools as a barrier to attendance. And that … Continued

STATEMENT: MIRA Coalition Issues Statement on U.S. District Court Ruling Striking Down Title 42

  Boston, MA – In response to the ruling by the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia striking down the Title 42 policy, Elizabeth Sweet, Executive Director of the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy (MIRA) Coalition issued the following statement: “We welcome the ruling from the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia striking down … Continued

STATEMENT: MIRA Coalition Condemns Biden Administration Expansion of Title 42

STATEMENT FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE October 13, 2022 Boston, MA – In response to the Biden Administration’s move to expand Title 42 restrictions to Venezuelan migrants, Elizabeth Sweet, Executive Director of the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy (MIRA) Coalition issued the following statement: “We are deeply disappointed by the Biden administration’s decision to expand the racist, … Continued

STATEMENT: MIRA Coalition Praises End of Harmful “Remain in Mexico” Policy

STATEMENT: MIRA Coalition Praises End of Harmful “Remain in Mexico” Policy Boston, MA – In response to the Supreme Court’s ruling in Biden v. Texas, which allows the Biden administration to terminate the Migrant Protection Protocols (better known as the “Remain in Mexico” policy), Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy (MIRA) Coalition Executive Director Elizabeth Sweet issued the following statement: “We are … Continued

Immigration Enforcement Bill Supporters See Improved Climate

Lawmakers and immigration reform activists are hopeful that a national reckoning on racial justice can generate enough momentum to secure passage this session on a bill divesting local police from most interactions with federal immigration enforcement. Read more from GBH.

A big milestone for the Safe Communities Act

BOSTON – Today the Joint Committee on Public Safety and Homeland Security reported out the Safe Communities Act (S.1401 and H.3573) with a recommendation that it “ought to pass.” The bill now goes to the House Ways and Means Committee. The Safe Communities Coalition, a diverse group of immigrant community leaders, civil rights and legal advocates, faith … Continued

New student rules are an assault on higher education and public health

BOSTON – On Monday, Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced that international students on F-1 and M-1 visas will be required to leave the country if the college or university program they’re enrolled in is online only – and even under some circumstances if the schools are operating on a hybrid online/in-person model. The impact … Continued

Standing up for racial justice

In his 1963 “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. wrote: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” For as long as any of us have been … Continued

BORTAC agents

Aggressive escalation of immigration enforcement will make Mass. less safe

On Friday we learned, through the media, that Border Patrol tactical units are being deployed in “sanctuary cities” across the U.S., including Boston, to assist Immigration & Customs Enforcement agents. Eva A. Millona, executive director of MIRA, has the following response: “We are very troubled and concerned about this escalation of immigration enforcement, which we … Continued