Congresswoman Pettersen Convenes Immigration Roundtable on ICE Oversight and Priorities for Next Congress, Unveils Bills Restricting ICE Access to Disaster Survivors’ Personal Data

Congresswoman Pettersen at today's immigration roundtable with representatives from Casa de Paz, Hispanic Contractors of Colorado, COLOR Latina, Mi Casa Resource Center, Rocky Mountain Immigrant Advocacy Network, Mi Familia Vota, American Friends Service Committee, Adelante Community Development, Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition, CLLARO, and Lideres Latines

LAKEWOOD - Today, Congresswoman Pettersen (CO-07) convened local leaders to discuss the ongoing abuses by Trump's rogue Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency and discuss with local leaders their shared priority to strengthen oversight and establish guardrails to protect immigrant communities in the next Congress. Pettersen also first announced to the group that she, alongside Congresswoman Sydney Kamlager-Dove (CA-37) today introduced two bills to protect disaster survivors' personal information from being used for the purposes of immigration enforcement. This comes after the devastating Aspen Acres and Willow Fires forced thousands of Coloradans to evacuate earlier this summer, raising concerns that data collected through the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and non-government entities to issue re-entry cards to affected areas in the wake of a natural disaster could be accessed by immigration enforcement.

"From the very beginning, Trump's ICE agency has acted without regard for basic human rights and safety - killing innocent people, detaining people in inhumane conditions, ripping families apart, and spreading fear throughout our immigrant communities. We need to rein in this agency and look ahead to what the next Congress can do to put real guardrails in place, hold ICE accountable, and protect our communities," saidCongresswoman Pettersen. "And no family fleeing a wildfire should have to wonder whether to ask for help or evacuate out of fear that their information will be used to target them. I'm so grateful for everyone who joined me today to have an honest discussion on how we can protect our neighbors and our community."

"Every family deserves access to resources following a natural disaster without fear that their information will be used against them," said Congresswoman Kamlager-Dove. "I am proud to join Rep. Pettersen on this package to prevent ICE from accessing data collected in response to a natural disaster. No one should be able to take advantage of our immigrant neighbors during a vulnerable time."

"No family should have to fear deportation when seeking safety from a wildfire or asking for help after a disaster," said Alex Sánchez, president and CEO of Voces Unidas. "These bills would help protect the personal information Latino and immigrant families share to get emergency assistance. We thank Congresswoman Brittany Pettersen for her leadership and urge Congress to pass these protections."

The roundtable brought together leaders from Casa de Paz, Hispanic Contractors of Colorado, COLOR Latina, Mi Casa Resource Center, Rocky Mountain Immigrant Advocacy Network, Mi Familia Vota, American Friends Service Committee, Adelante Community Development, Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition, CLLARO, and Lideres Latines to discuss how ICE's enforcement practices are affecting immigrant communities across Colorado.

The group discussed the various abuses that ICE has carried out on communities, including the killings of multiple innocent people including American citizens, the long-term detention of individuals in temporary holding cells that lack basic access to sanitation, and repeated ICE operations in and around sensitive areas including schools and churches. Wait times for immigration cases, applications, and work authorization documents have also been affected, with certain applications now taking over 6 months to process - leaving families facing prolonged uncertainty about their immigration cases and ability to work. Pettersen focused the discussion on where gaps in services are leaving families without support as well as her priorities for the 120th Congress, including bipartisan opportunities to expand access to counsel, improve detention transparency, and strengthen protections for children and mothers.

During the discussion, Pettersen also announced the introduction of her two new bills, the Emergency Assistance Privacy Protection Act and the Disaster Data Protection Act. These bills prohibit FEMA from sharing disaster survivors' personally identifiable information with ICE and prohibit ICE from obtaining disaster data collected by third parties without a judicial warrant, respectively. This followed the Congresswoman's visits to areas affected by this year's Willow and Aspen Acres Fires, which burned over 100,000 acres of land, including in Custer and Lake counties, and forced thousands to evacuate from their homes. Residents affected by the evacuations expressed concerns that the personal information collected by FEMA in the wake of a natural disaster to administer re-entry cards to evacuated areas could be accessed and used by ICE for non-targeted immigration enforcement. This raises larger concerns that members of the immigrant community would forgo evacuation orders or fail to properly identify themselves to first responders and other disaster response personnel out of fear that this information will be accessed by ICE.

Specifically, the Emergency Assistance Privacy Protection Act would:

• Prohibit data sharing of any personally identifiable information collected by FEMA with ICE.

• Full bill text can be found HERE.

Specifically, the Disaster Data Protection Act would:

• Prohibit ICE from obtaining data collected by a third party during a disaster absent a criminal warrant.

• Full bill text can be found HERE.

Under the Trump Administration, Congressional Republicans have repeatedly voted to send more money to ICE and immigration enforcement with no guardrails, including over $70 billion initially through H.R. 1 and an additional $70 billion this past summer for ICE and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) over three years - even as the agency has come under fire for its conduct. Pettersen has consistently voted against allocating additional funds to ICE, calling for major regulatory oversight and guardrails to keep immigrant communities safe.

Congresswoman Brittany Pettersen has repeatedly pushed back against Trump's harmful immigration policiesand efforts to pour billions more into ICE and CBP without meaningful accountability. She has voted against enforcement funding packages, backed legislation requiring agents to visibly identify themselves, and supported restoring protections for schools, hospitals, and places of worship. Alongside Senators Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper, she demanded that the administration abandon plans for a new ICE detention facility in Hudson,Colorado. She has also pressed for answers about prolonged detention in field office holding cells and proposed safeguards to protect detained parents' children and prevent immigration detainees from being held in federal prisons.

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