MIRA Blog
MIRA advocates for the rights and opportunities of immigrants and refugees. In partnership with its members, MIRA advances this mission through policy analysis and advocacy, institutional organizing, training and leadership development, and strategic communications.
Today, the Boston Herald published an article highlighting the efforts of two MA Sheriffs – Thomas 
Hodgson of Bristol and Joseph McDonald of Plymouth – who are trying to join the federal Secure Communities (SComm) program. Under Secure Communities, all people who are arrested would have their fingerprints run through the federal IDENT database which contains nearly 100 million records of people who have had previous contact with US Citizenship and Immigration Services, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or Customs and Border Protection. Apparently, these sheriffs are ignorant of what’s already happening in the jails they are supposed to be running.
The Massachusetts Department of Corrections already has a 287(g) agreement with the federal government (so named because the program is authorized under Section 287(g) of the Immigration and Nationality Act). Under this agreement, people who are serving time in Massachusetts prisons have their fingerprints run against the IDENT database. In other words, what these two sheriffs are trying to do – and what they are criticizing the governor for not doing – IS ALREADY BEING DONE. It would be nice if the people who are responsible for our jails actually knew what was going on inside them, wouldn’t it?
It would also be nice if the Herald got its own facts rights. Two sheriffs who are clueless about what’s happening in their jails are not “tough-on-crime”; they’re simply trying to score political points. And Governor Patrick did not pull out of the program; MA was never part of the program to begin with. Also, the Herald and other anti-immigrant folks should stop using the example of Luis Guaman Cela to support S-Comm. There’s no reason to believe that Mr. Cela would have been identified by S-Comm. If he had no previous contact with immigration authorities, his fingerprints would not have been in the IDENT database. What he did have contact with were criminal law enforcement, and yet the NCIC database that the FBI uses failed to properly identify him. Using the failure of one well-established database to push for the addition of another database that would not have even had the person’s information on file is a sad example of how far supporters of S-Comm have to stretch to advance a failed program.
— Sarang Sekhavat, Federal Policy Director, MIRA
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