Faith leaders call for neighbors to record, intervene if ICE ramps up Milwaukee presence

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- A collection of faith leaders joined demonstrators Friday morning outside the Milwaukee field office for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). 

Milwaukee Inner-city Congregations Allied for Hope (MICAH) had several of its members speak outside the field office. Standing in the snow, they likened the idea of ramped up ICE operations to a natural disaster.

"Friends, an ICE storm is coming," said Bishop Paul Erickson, from the Evangelical Lutheran Church in American. "And we better get ready."

When asked if they had any specific information indicating ICE planned to increase its presence in Milwaukee, the faith leaders said they did not. However, they pointed to the large and increasing operations in neighboring Minnesota as reason to be on alert.

"We know we would be naive to assume that we are somehow going to be free from such an invasion of ICE," Erickson said. "We don't know when, but it is highly likely."

The MICAH members encouraged people to become trained legal observers, to join whistle campaigns that cause a scene when ICE attempts to make arrests and to record ICE's actions anytime officers are spotted.

"It is our right as American citizens, to legally observe what federal agents are doing in our city," Rev. Jennifer Nordstrom, of the First Unitarian Society of Milwaukee, said. "So, become trained in that, to be prepared for that."

ICE, itself, is tight-lipped about any future operations. In a statement to CBS 58 earlier this week, an ICE spokesperson wrote, "To protect operational security and ensure the safety of law enforcement personnel, ICE does not provide information regarding potential or ongoing enforcement actions.”

Earlier this week, at the Wisconsin Homeland Security Council meeting in Madison, Milwaukee Police Chief Jeffrey Norman said ICE is continuously operating in the city. 

Norman did not answer a question about whether he had any information indicating ICE would be ramping up its operations in Milwaukee, instead saying police would continue to follow agreements already in place with federal agencies.

"We understand that we always have ICE in our city," Norman said. "And so, we work with our partners, making sure we talk to each other, collaboration."

The FBI's Milwaukee field office posted to social media Wednesday about its work with federal immigration officers in the arrest of a man the agency described as a Nicaraguan national who'd previously been charged with possession of child pornography.

Milwaukee's representative in Congress, Rep. Gwen Moore, was one of several Democrats to attend a congressional field hearing Friday in St. Paul. 

Moore questioned the chief of police in Mendota Heights, a suburb of the Twin Cities. Moore asked Chief Kelly McCarthy if local police can intervene during an ICE arrest.

"We cannot interfere in a lawful arrest," McCarthy told Moore. "And we have no authority or ability to force them to answer our questions."  

CBS 58 also reached out to the office of GOP Congressman Bryan Steil, whose office includes the southern edge of Milwaukee County. Steil's office did not respond to a request for an interview.