This 18-year-old is protecting his California farm community – and his own mother – from ICE

Cesar Vasquez, who has supported families of undocumented immigrants since age 14, has become a community lifeline – and a known ICE target While most 18-year-olds worry about college papers and spring break plans, Cesar Vasquez drives through coastal California farm towns scanning for unmarked SUVs before dawn. He flips down his driver’s seat visor to look at a taped list of license plates he has already identified as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) vehicles, and jots down a few new ones he suspects could be. His phone buzzes constantly – tips from neighbors, text chains from volunteers alerting to ICE activity – all in an attempt to keep his community safe from being swept up in federal agents’ widening dragnet. This is what organizing looks like for this son of undocumented immigrants. In his home town of Santa Maria, a small farming town on California’s central coast where over 80% of farm workers are undocumented, Vasquez has become both a crucial community lifeline and a known target of federal immigration enforcement. Continue reading...

By Jennifer Chowdhury with photographs by Zaydee Sanchez in Santa Maria, California

Democrats turn their backs on DHS and ICE when America needs them most

Republicans push DHS funding bill while Democrats seek to strip ICE enforcement authority and restrict cooperation with law enforcement agencies.