"The woman's cries echo down the hallway, shattering the usual silence of a courtroom. Her four-year-old daughter joins in, beginning to cry in her father's arms as the family is surrounded by half a dozen masked agents. The only other sounds are the whispers of volunteers, who are quickly trying to identify the family about to be detained, and the cameras of journalists witnessing the scene. It's impossible to hear what the immigration officials are saying to the Venezuelan couple, as they are cornered."
"The Lower Manhattan skyscraper houses both the main offices of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in the city, on the fifth and ninth floors, and several immigration courts spread across the 12th and 14th floors. Every week, hundreds of migrants, most of them asylum seekers, arrive here for appointments or hearings that until recently were routine but have now become ambushes."
Masked and armed ICE and Customs and Border Protection officers patrol 26 Federal Plaza, turning routine hearings and appointments into surprise detentions. The building contains both ICE offices and immigration courtrooms where volunteers and journalists witness frantic scenes of families cornered and escorted away. Migrants, many of them asylum seekers, arrive for appointments or hearings and face plainclothes officers, ski masks, and aggressive tactics. The presence of heavily armed agents creates fear and confusion, with detained families sometimes missing for hours. The operation reflects a concentrated immigration enforcement effort in New York City courts and federal offices.
Read at english.elpais.com
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