By Caleigh Bartash

Students at the University of Maryland are pushing for the school to end its contract with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and support undocumented community members. 

Political Latinxs United for Movement and Action in Society is leading the effort. The organization, known as PLUMAS, has been working to end UMD’s involvement with ICE for years.

UMD has had a contract with the Homeland Security Investigations division of ICE since 2017.  Experts at the university’s National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism — better known as START — provide counterterrorism training to homeland security special agents.

Emiliano Calvo Alcaniz, a sophomore environmental science and policy major and the vice president of PLUMAS, said his organization has mostly strategized so far because it is an issue that must be dealt with cautiously. Calvo Alcaniz referenced the university’s efforts to fill its new undocumented student life coordinator position. Rocío Fregoso-Mota was recently announced to take on the role.

“Obviously the most important thing is protecting students and making sure that they feel safe and comfortable,” Calvo Alcaniz said. “And up until really like a week or two ago, the undocumented student program coordinator position wasn’t completely confirmed. And so we didn’t want to do anything quick and rash in an attempt to get rid of the ICE contracts that could endanger that position that is so, so necessary.” 

According to Calvo Alcaniz, PLUMAS has a two-phase plan. First they will gather information through research. The second phase is coalition education, which will involve informing the student body about the contract and why it should be ended.

Calvo Alcaniz said he thinks the contract says something about UMD’s priorities.

“They have a financial relationship with ICE that gives students jobs,” he said. “And they’re saying that financial relationship is more important than the students who are affected emotionally, physically, mentally by having to know that ICE has connections to this campus.”

Following PLUMAS’s lead is UMD Young Democratic Socialists of America, one of many campus organization partners participating in the movement against the contract. 

Andrew Ferguson, vice president of UMD YDSA, said his organization decided to take action after the federal government threatened to deport international students who were not taking in-person classes during the fall semester due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Ferguson, a junior information sciences major, said he believes ICE is inherently hostile to undocumented people in the U.S.

“I think it sends a message that undocumented students are unwelcome or that they are some kind of other when what I think the university’s responsibility should be is to be as welcoming as possible to all kinds of students, regardless of nation of origin,” Ferguson said.

A university FAQ page says the commitment is not with the Enforcement and Removal Operations division and that university partnerships with ICE block contracts from going to organizations with political agendas. But students say any relationship with ICE is a danger to the immigrant community.

One international student, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of jeopardizing her visa, said even though she was aware the contract was related to counterterrorism, knowing ICE would be on campus still made her feel unsafe.

“It feels kind of like a threat, maybe not from UMD’s part, but it’s kind of the idea that we’re being watched or that there’s some sort of vigilance happening,” she said. “And that’s not very comforting because you feel like anything that could go wrong — if for some reason there’s disciplinary action or something like that — you know that the administration will find out but you don’t know how far that can go.”

The contract is worth $625,000 and is expected to end in March 2022. When asked to comment on UMD’s plans to renew the contract and students’ calls to end it, Hafsa Siddiqi of the UMD Office of Strategic Communications referred to a university statement that detailed the parameters of the contract. 

Although PLUMAS had been working to end UMD’s relationship with ICE for years before Calvo Alcaniz’s arrival, he was not hopeful that the contract would be ended early. Like Ferguson, he had other ideas for the university to support undocumented people.

Calvo Alcaniz and Ferguson both said they want UMD to become a sanctuary university. One part of the sanctuary campus platform directs universities to deny ICE physical access to all of their land. 

Ferguson said he thinks the university needs to promise to never disclose students’ undocumented statuses to law enforcement and to take a more active stance on immigration.

“I think the university should not just be neutral towards deportation and violations of undocumented students rights but also be actively against it,” Ferguson said. “So the university should fight for undocumented rights, not just sort of roll over and let it happen.”

Featured Image: PLUMAS leading a walkout in front of McKeldin Library on Nov. 17, 2016.

Photo courtesy of Emiliano Calvo Alcaniz.