Proposed detention center, immigration crackdown spurs flurry of Salt Lake City protests

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Protesters gathered again Tuesday to protest apparent plans for an immigrant detention facility in Salt Lake City.
The demonstration paralleled several protests around the city by foes of federal immigration agents' approach to rounding up and detaining immigrants.
The federal government, meantime, offered a sharp rebuke to the critics.

SALT LAKE CITY — Amid rumblings that the property deal to allow construction of an immigrant detention facility in Salt Lake City is moving forward, foes of the project gathered again Tuesday to protest the plans.

The federal government, meantime, offered a sharp rebuke to the critics.

At a hastily called demonstration against plans for a Utah detention facility, Sarah Buck, who helps lead Salt Lake Indivisible, said news reports seem to be corroborating plans for other purported detention facilities around the country, adding credibility to talk of a Utah facility. The apparent Salt Lake city site in an industrial area west of Salt Lake City International Airport appears along with other sites on a list leaked last week to immigrant advocates nationwide.

"What we're seeing nationwide is that list has been accurate," Buck said, as around 50 demonstrators protested outside the offices of the Ritchie Group, owner of the land in question. "With that in mind, you should be ashamed. I can't believe that there are people who think that this is a good idea. We have the history of Topaz to show us what happens when we blindly follow government."

Topaz was an internment camp near Delta used during World War II, where Japanese Americans were relocated.

Demonstrators gather outside the offices of a developer involved in an alleged proposal to build an immigration detention center in Salt Lake City to protest the plans on Tuesday. Additional protests around the city were planned against the ongoing immigrant crackdown. (Photo: Tim Vandenack, KSL.com)

The demonstration came amid a flurry of protests on Tuesday around Salt Lake City against what participants view as the heavy-handed approach of federal immigration agents in detaining immigrants suspected of being in the country illegally. Demonstrators gathered on the University of Utah campus and at the state Capitol on Tuesday. Later, immigrant advocates addressed the issue at Tuesday evening's meeting of the Salt Lake City Council.

Around 100 Ogden High School students also walked out of class early on Tuesday to protest the ongoing immigration crackdown, holding signs along busy Harrison Boulevard outside the school, generating honks of support and jeers.

While respectful of students' First Amendment rights, school district spokesman Jer Bates said school officials "encourage these activities to take place outside of school hours to avoid interrupting the school day for our students and staff."

A federal government spokeswoman, for her part, blasted the critics, while also saying officials have no detention center plans to announce. She took particular umbrage at the suggestion that immigration detention centers are akin to internment camps.

"This is disgusting. ICE detention facilities are not internment camps. This type of rhetoric is leading to our officers facing a more than 1,300% increase in assaults against them," said Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary for public affairs at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which oversees Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

She went on to reiterate remarks to KSL from the department last week that immigration agents target "the worst of the worst," including murderers, rapists and gang members. Those in detention centers, moreover, "receive full due process and have access to attorneys," she said

'Extremely solid' source

T.J. Young, who also took part in the detention center demonstration in Salt Lake City, said Tuesday that she heard news the detention center plans in Utah were edging ahead from an "extremely solid" source. The signing of the initial paperwork to allow the transfer of the land to another owner for eventual development into a detention facility is proceeding, according to the source.

Reps from the Ritchie Group didn't immediately return a call seeking comment, and no one was inside their office on Tuesday on Brickyard Road, where the demonstration took place. The talk has sparked concern among Salt Lake City and Salt Lake County officials, but they said Tuesday that they had no additional information on the matter.

"We haven't had any sort of engagement, nor permitting requests, infrastructure inquiries, etc.," said Andrew Wittenberg, spokesman for Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall. City leaders, he said, aren't typically apprised of real estate transactions in the city.

Likewise, Liz Sollis, spokeswoman for Salt Lake County Mayor Jenny Wilson, said county officials are still trying to get additional information. Wilson issued a statement Saturday criticizing the notion of a detention center, saying it "would bring disruption, strain local resources and harm the economic and social fabric of our community."

According to Young, the document identifying the supposed immigration detention center sites around the country indicates that the Salt Lake proposal would house 7,500 beds. The location is 1197 N. 6880 West, where demonstrators gathered Friday to protest the apparent plans. Last week, the Department of Homeland Security said it didn't have any detention center announcements to make, the same as Tuesday. But the department also noted an injection of funding to expand detention space in a budget bill inked in July by President Donald Trump.

The demonstrators held several signs spelling out "Ritchie Group = ICE abuse," among others.

Judy Johnson, one of the protesters, said she isn't opposed to culprits facing arrest for criminal misdeeds. "But I am against the way ICE is handling this, that people are losing their rights. They don't have due process. They get rounded up and sent to these detention centers with no way of contacting legal help, with no rights, absolutely no rights," she said.

Others protest, address Salt Lake City Council

At the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, around 100 students took part in a walkout organized by student group Mecha de U of U. Leaders of the group said the walkout was held in solidarity with others across the nation and with protesters in Minneapolis who have been demonstrating against the heavy presence of immigration agents in the city. Renee Good was killed by an immigration agent when he shot into her car in a Jan. 7 encounter in the city, which has spurred intense unrest.

Samantha Reagan chastised Immigration and Customs Enforcement, saying its operations are "inherently and increasingly violent."

"Detention and deportation, hunting down innocent people, separating families, keeping human beings in cages and inhuman conditions has always been ICE's function," Reagan said. "This mass deportation campaign was never about law and order. It was about terrorizing immigrant communities and anyone who stands up, out of solidarity with their neighbors."

Reagan and other students also criticized the university's messaging around the presence of Immigration and Customs Enforcement on campus.

"We'd like them (U. leaders) to make a plan and say that they're willing to defend students against illegal actions by ICE," said Benji, who didn't give his last name. "ICE has been completely disobeying all laws of this country in their abductions and deportations, and the University of Utah has an obligation to protect students and let students know that they would be protected if ICE were to come on campus."

Benji added that he doesn't think the university would take any actions that could "upset the right-wing Legislature in this state."

Around 200 demonstrators gathered on the steps of the Utah Capitol in Salt Lake City on Tuesday to protest what they view as the heavy-handed federal crackdown on immigration. It was one of several protests. (Photo: Tim Vandenack, KSL.com)

Later Tuesday, around 200 demonstrators gathered on the south steps of the Utah Capitol for a protest organized by the Party for Socialism and Liberation of Salt Lake City. Immigration agents, said Adrian Rollins, an organizer with the group, have inflicted an "immense amount of violence" on immigrants and even U.S. citizens, one of the spurs for the event.

After that at the Salt Lake City Council meeting, dozens of people, generally critical of the facility, pressed the city to step in on the issue, similar to requests put to the council last week. Many added new concerns they had about the potential immigration detention facility, while some said they plan to show up to more meetings because they don't believe there's anywhere else to go to voice their worries.

"It's absolutely absurd that I'm talking to this body. I would rather be talking to someone on the federal level — I think we all would. We would rather be talking to our congressional representatives, but that line has failed," said Stephen Otterstrom, a west-side resident who narrowly lost his bid for the City Council last year. "They are not here for us. … We are here because you are the last line of defense."

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