Letter from Paul Mendelsohn

Due Process Is All We Ask

After pledging to uphold “liberty and justice for all” more times than anyone can recall, and wars fought on that principle, we are confronted by a regime refusing to honor those rights.

Pedro Mieles, who is here legally on an asylum agreement, is the latest county resident to be taken by ICE without due process. Escaping Ecuador after witnessing a murder, Pedro came to the U.S. in search of safety and has been working two jobs in our community. Upon arriving for his one-year check-in in Albany, he was abruptly arrested by ICE. “Doing it the right way” is no longer an option.

He has disappeared—into CECOT? The hands of the people he escaped from?

With federal funding for legal aid assisting immigrants largely eliminated, Pedro has no recourse and his supporters have no way of even locating him.

Are we ridding our country of “the worst of the worst”—or our neighbors and low-wage workers who follow the law? With a goal of 7,000 arrests per day, and a 400 percent increase in the ICE budget, who will be next, as lobbyists for the booming for-profit prison industry seek their next revenue stream? Are masked, unidentified, unaccountable agents making arrests—with or without a warrant—our future?

Due process is all we ask. Please demand that Congress reclaim their constitutional authority and demand liberty and justice for all. Call your legislators: https://www.usa.gov/elected-officials.

Know someone at risk? See https://www.nilc.org/resources/know-your-rights-card/ and https://immigrantjustice.org/for-immigrants/know-your-rights/what-do-if-you-or-loved-one-detained/

Also consider getting involved with www.CooperstownOneontaIndivisible.org/

Paul Mendelsohn
Cherry Valley