Elie Mystal for The Nation: Dismantle ICE, or GTFO.

[Celerity]

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ICE must go

Donald Trump and the goon squad we call ICE are getting very comfortable with turning people into political prisoners. ICE has been harassing, menacing, and brutalizing immigrants for years. They respond to any attempt to question their authority with violence. But now, they’re doing it to elected officials too. Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, Representative LaMonica McIver, US Senator Alex Padilla, and now New York City Comptroller Brad Lander have all been detained and even arrested in recent weeks for daring to ask ICE to follow the law.

ICE must be dismantled. Both its officials and rank-and-file brownshirts must be fired. ICE has proven itself to be incompatible with a system of democratic self-government based on the due process of laws. Whatever the hell you think this country needs to do to enforce its immigration laws, it cannot be ICE. The organization cannot be allowed to continue to exist.

Democrats, of course, had the chance to dismantle ICE during the Biden administration. But they did not. Biden and the larger forces running the Democratic Party not only allowed ICE to continue brutalizing immigrants; they shouted down anybody who advocated that ICE should be destroyed. The Democrats’ fear of being tagged as supporting “defund the police,” or being called “soft” on immigration, led them to defend a domestic gestapo force that seems to have literally no respect for the law and uses violence as a first option.

It is perhaps too early to start thinking about the 2028 Democratic primary. It is perhaps naïve to think we’ll even be allowed to have a 2028 Democratic primary, let alone to win a free and fair general election. But know this: I will not support any Democrat who supports ICE. Its actions have radicalized me into a single-issue voter. Dismantle ICE, or GTFO.