Fighting Dhs Immigration Raids

Floor Speech

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Ms. ADAMS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, my community of Charlotte was under siege by the Department of Homeland Security's campaign of terror last month. They called it Operation Charlotte's Web.

Border Patrol agents engaged in extreme racial profiling, excessive force, and brutal tactics, spreading fear in our community.

It was fear that shattered the car window of a U.S. citizen born in Honduras. He was thrown on the glass-covered ground in handcuffs after he already identified himself to agents.

It was fear when more than 30,000 Charlotte-Mecklenburg students, 21 percent of the student body, were absent from school on the Monday after the raids began because parents were terrified that their children would be victims of CBP's brutality.

It was fear as businesses shuttered their doors to try and protect their customers and employees from being wrongfully targeted by these Federal agents.

Cruelty was the point of their operation, but Charlotte never caved in to their cruelty. Instead, citizens packed churches for training to empower themselves to respond to Border Patrol agents. Parents band together to safely get their children to school, and businessowners patrolled the streets to protect their neighbors, their customers, and their employers.

CBP's actions in Charlotte were deplorable and absolutely unacceptable. I have already reached out to DHS and demanded transparency on exactly what Border Patrol was doing in Charlotte. I am still waiting for answers to my questions.

Make no mistake about it. My constituents want answers. I do, too. They deserve the answers, and I am going to keep fighting for them.

Congress must end these unlawful, un-American, and unnecessary raids on our communities.

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