[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 100 (Wednesday, June 11, 2025)]
[House]
[Page H2623]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  PROTECTING OUR IMMIGRANT COMMUNITIES

  (Ms. Pressley of Massachusetts was recognized to address the House 
for 5 minutes.)
  Ms. PRESSLEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of our neighbors 
and community members, our immigrant brothers and sisters who are being 
targeted and abducted, taken from their homes, torn away from their 
babies, and disappeared on their way to church, work, and school.
  There are children crying in their teachers' arms, families 
separated, and communities traumatized that if they have not already 
been kidnapped, they are fearful that they will be.
  Children crying in their teachers' arms are afraid that they are 
going to come home and their parents will be gone. There are elders 
carrying all of their medications with them in their comings and goings 
for fear of being abducted and sent somewhere without access to 
necessary healthcare.
  We see a spike in no-shows and cancelations at health clinics as 
patients would rather miss critical care than risk detainment. We see 
young parents and grandparents alike attending their immigration court 
hearings, eager to officially call this country their home, only to be 
met with handcuffs and shoved into cars by masked ICE individuals.

  This is Donald Trump's America, but these are real people. These are 
hardworking people whose labor and contributions make our communities a 
better place. These are young people who show up every day in our 
schools as part of our learning communities. These are mothers and 
fathers working overtime to provide for their children.
  In my district, Massachusetts-07, my Chelsea constituent Kenia and 
her three children were driving to a Mother's Day church service with 
her husband, Daniel, when ICE agents in unmarked vehicles ambushed 
them, broke the passenger side window, forcefully extracted Daniel from 
the car, and slammed his face on the hot sidewalk while their three 
children watched on in horror.
  In East Boston, my constituent Mercedes and her son are struggling 
after her husband, Jose, was arrested at work and detained for 2 days 
at an ICE facility in Burlington. Jose was living here legally with 
temporary protected status but was told by the ICE agents who detained 
him that only people born here have rights.
  These are real people--real people--children and adults alike 
traumatized, whose lives have been disturbed, upended, and irreparably 
harmed.
  Donald Trump and ICE claim that they are committing this assault on 
our communities in the name of safety. Terror makes no one safe. It 
does the opposite. It sows chaos. It breeds fear and fosters unrest.
  From my home in Massachusetts-07, where mothers have wept on my 
shoulder, pleading for their husbands to come home and for their 
families to be reunited, to Los Angeles, where Donald Trump sent the 
National Guard and the Marines to descend on justice-seeking, peaceful 
protesters, the hurt and harm of this hostile White House is felt by us 
all.
  This has nothing to do with law and order. That is laughable coming 
from the most godless, lawless Oval Office occupant in our history.
  This has everything to do with power and control: deploying the 
National Guard without a Governor's approval and taking unwarranted and 
unprecedented action against peaceful justice seekers and freedom 
fighters.
  We must see our neighbors' humanity in this moment. Yet, across the 
country, occupant Trump is working overtime to be a fascist dictator, 
to weaponize our government against its own people, to sow fear and 
chaos, and to silence dissenting voices in our communities, at our 
colleges, in the courts, and, in fact, even in Congress.
  These actions are lawless, a complete violation of our constitutional 
rights to due process, and void of common sense and compassion.
  Know this, for those of you watching at home who might be tempted to 
think that this is not your problem: An extremist march toward fascism 
is everyone's problem. Trust me, if you are not already suffering, you 
will be.
  We need solidarity, resistance, and a rejection in this moment of 
these attacks on our immigrant communities. An attack on our immigrant 
communities is an attack on all of us.
  As a woman of faith, my God tells me to welcome the stranger. Do not 
be indifferent to the suffering of your neighbors. Immigrants make our 
country a better place. Immigrants make America great, and our 
immigrant brothers and sisters deserve to call this country home.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Meuser). Members are reminded to refrain 
from engaging in personalities toward the President.

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