Illegal immigrants go free; some offered work permits

The arrest of 28 illegal immigrants at a small engine plant in Bellingham has ignited a national political firestorm over work-site raids carried out under the Obama administration.

The Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE) raid at Yamato Engine Specialists on Feb. 24 was the first of this presidential administration. Under massive pressure from immigrant advocates, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano the next day ordered a probe into the actions of the Seattle-based ICE team that conducted the raid.

In the weeks that followed, most of the Bellingham workers were either released for humanitarian reasons or after posting bond. At least one was deported. And the remaining workers still in custody were freed without bail last week and offered legal permission to work in the United States.

Napolitano also has delayed raids planned for other work sites, while she reviews policies under which ICE agents carry out these actions.

Her review of what happened in Bellingham will be part of a revised set of guidelines expected to be issued this week, directing ICE agents to focus more on arresting and prosecuting employers and less on the illegal immigrants they hire.

Her actions come amid a new level of outrage nationwide over illegal immigration in a struggling U.S. economy with fewer and fewer jobs.

"Secretary Napolitano wants to make sure workplace enforcement is operating the way it should," her spokesman Matt Chandler said. "She is focused on using our limited resources to the greatest effect — targeting criminal aliens and employers that flout our laws and deliberately cultivate an illegal work force."

He referred to ICE questions about the logistics of focusing on U.S. employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants while ignoring the workers themselves.

ICE agents and the U.S. attorneys who prosecute immigration cases have said it's far tougher to build a criminal case showing an employer knowingly hired illegal immigrants than to prove that an immigrant is working in the United States illegally.

While some worksite actions have been delayed, Chandler said the department is continuing other worksite actions that are "consistent with department priorities."

ICE spokeswoman Lorie Dankers declined to comment about the release of the last of the Bellingham workers except to say, "Many of the individuals have been released pending further investigation of Yamato."

Ira Mehlman, a spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, said, "I think its fair to surmise that this is being done under political and not legal pressure. ... There's a certain irony here — the way this administration is going, you may be better off getting busted than not."

ICE investigators said many of the workers at Yamato were from Mexico and Central America and had used false documents to gain employment.

Immediately after their arrests, three women with young children and a fourth worker with a medical condition were released from the Northwest Detention Center on humanitarian grounds. At least one other worker was deported.

In the weeks that followed, several others were released — some posting bond ranging from $3,000 to $11,000, and some without bail.

Illegal immigrants arrested in raids or other ICE actions often are detained for months until a judge can see them. Some waive their rights to a hearing and agree to return home.

Immigration attorneys Tuesday said offering work permits is highly unusual, and usually at the discretion of ICE officials in cases where immigrants have information prosecutors can use in criminal prosecution.

Yamato co-owner Shirin Dhanani Makalai said she is confident the investigation will show her company "complied fully with the law."

Rosalinda Guillen, whose Bellingham-based organization Community to Community advocates for immigrants, said the workers are cautious and confused.

"These families are caught in the middle of this big political storm," she said. "It's a good thing, the work permit — the recognition that these people need to work and support themselves and their families. But there's no real security for them beyond the short term.

"We hope these changes will create a new precedent in how raids are done, that it leads to them being stopped completely."

Before they were released last week, the workers were asked to sign forms acknowledging that deportation action against them was being deferred and they were being offered work permits. Agents delivered the same forms to the homes of those workers who were released earlier.

Based on questions agents have been asking workers, Guillen said, "it appears they are trying to justify this raid, trying to find some criminal action against the employer. They're playing this game of divide and conquer, and that's not the Obama way."

Lornet Turnbull: 206-464-2420 or lturnbull@seattletimes.com