Attorney Adam Crayk recently won an asylum case for a Utah woman, and he was confident that he could get her husband legal status in the country, too. But, the immigration and criminal defense attorney said, the man was so anxious about the process that he instead chose to leave the United States of his own accord.
“[He was] 100% eligible for papers,” Crayk said during a recent interview. “He was so freaked out. He couldn’t stand the lack of understanding, the lack of clarity that’s going on right now. He left. He just left.”
In the midst of nationwide Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids and responsive protests, immigration advocates and attorneys say the legal reality for many immigrants without legal status in Utah right now is overwhelming, confusing and terrifying.
“ICE agents have certain sets of marching orders,” Crayk said. “[Orders are] coming directly from Washington, D.C. There’s not a lot of discretion on the ground here, so they’re getting involved in arresting anything and everything that they can, which is causing all sorts of repercussions in the community.”
And although Republican leaders, both nationally and in Utah, have said there is a focus on deporting violent criminals, attorneys and advocates in the state said they’ve been told ICE agents have arrest quotas to hit, regardless of whether the person has a criminal record.
“They are being encouraged to go after whoever they can find, and there have been quotas given out,” said Brian Tanner, a Utah-based immigration and family law attorney. “The numbers change from time to time … but there hasn’t really been any major efforts to try to identify criminals, other than what ICE has always done, which is go into the jails.”
Jim McConkie of the Refugee Justice League said his organization has heard the same from ICE.
“What these quotas mean is that you just have to go for the easy pickings,” he said. “There’s just not enough criminals to deport fast enough for Trump to keep his base stoked up. That’s what’s going on, in my opinion.”
The ICE field office in Salt Lake City, which oversees Utah, Idaho, Montana and Nevada, did not respond to a request for comment on whether agents in the area have been given arrest quotas and what those quotas are.
Earlier this week, The Washington Post reported that all 30 ICE field offices have been given inspection quotas as they investigate companies suspected of employing undocumented immigrants. And Reuters reported that President Donald Trump’s administration has increased arrest targets from 1,000 per day to 3,000 a day.
Tanner said that immigration law has always been complicated and often contradictory, but that since Trump took office in January, it’s become increasingly confusing and frustrating.
“It’s just really, really confusing for just the general public to keep up with,” Tanner said, “but even attorneys ourselves, we can still go ‘Well, it doesn’t look like the government’s updated the website to actually provide current information on who’s being affected by one of their decisions.’”
And both Tanner and McConkie said that the chilling effect of the recent raids has already been palpable in their work.
“They won’t go out of their homes,” McConkie said of immigrant families he works with. “Their father leaves in the morning for work, and they worry all day that he might not come back.”
This fear is not new, many advocates said, but it has been enhanced in recent days and weeks. House Minority Leader Rep. Angela Romero said in an interview that she has heard from many worried constituents recently.
“There are many people in my district who are mixed status, and they are scared,” the Democratic lawmaker said. “Families are being torn apart, and people are being racially profiled. People are afraid to leave their homes, and people are afraid that they might come home and somebody is not going to be there, or somebody is going to show up at their door.”
Adding to this chaos and confusion, Crayk said, is a recent case in Tacoma, Washington, where a judge has ruled that anyone who entered the country illegally at any time can be held without bond. “That means zero criminal history,” he said. “They can be detained and [have] no opportunity for a bond.”
The immigration court in Aurora, Colorado, Crayk said, recently followed suit, and he has clients with cases in that court now being held without bond.
“There’s so many things up in the air right now,” he added. “Never in my life, I’ve never seen something like this.”
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