POLK COUNTY, Fla. — Local volunteers say violent immigration enforcement actions in Minnesota are pushing more people in Polk County to take action.
As concern grows, dozens of residents are stepping up as legal observers, trained to document immigration enforcement activity.
WATCH: Polk County residents become legal observers amid ICE fears
“SALUTE is an acronym to help us remember what we’re supposed to be documenting. S for the size of the group, A is for action what type of action is taking place. L is for the location. U is for the type of uniforms that are being worn. T is for the time and date and is E for what kind of equipment are they carrying,” said Kimberly Edmond.
Edmond recently became a legal observer, trained through the ACLU to monitor immigration enforcement without interfering.
“I start filming as soon as I get there and we maintain the HALO law which is 25 feet and just stay in the background. If we’re told to move back, we move back,” Edmond said.
Edmond told me that her motivation is personal because her grandchildren are half-Mexican.
“I never in my life thought I’d have to worry. It just feels hopeless. So, this way you know I feel like I’m doing something that’s going to make a difference,” Edmond said.
She is not alone. Legal observer Carolyn Bowman documented when Lakeland police officers and Polk County sheriff deputies, who work in partnership with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, detained a man in Mulberry who was driving home with his family, leaving relatives shaken.
“I had to endure the grandmother crying, weeping uncontrollably, using the word ‘corazón’ repeatedly,” Bowman said.
Bowman told me she has seen firsthand the fear immigration enforcement can cause.
“You got people afraid to go to work, you got people afraid to go to the grocery store, you got people afraid to go to church. Out of fear of ICE,” Bowman said.
Their work has taken on a new urgency following the deadly shootings of legal observers Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis earlier this month.
“It blew my mind. It also made me realize that maybe now people will start to wake up because before when it was all migrants dying, people were looking the other way,” said Magdalene D.
Magdalene holds prayer vigils every month for people who have died while in ICE custody. She told me the deaths of American citizens has sparked a surge in legal observer interest.
“When I was doing these vigils, it was only 10 people coming. After Renee Good died, we had 70. Then also an explosion of interest from what I’ve heard in legal observer training,” Magdalene said.
Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said the situation here does not compare to Minnesota.
“I look forward to those that want to observe those that want to legally protest. We welcome that. That’s what our constitution is all about, but there’s really not much to observe here.We don’t have the environment for what you’re seeing in Minnesota because we cooperate with ICE and quite frankly, we’re not doing anything different here than we’ve ever done,” Judd said.
But immigration attorney Jean Pierre Espinoza said some enforcement practices raise concerns.
“The practice of ICE of covering their faces and not disclosing their IDs is not a right practice. It’s debatable if the rights of the people that are detained are violated or not. That would be something for the course to decide,” Espinoza said.
In Polk County, nearly 50 trained illegal observers now stand ready, telling me they will continue showing up.
“I’m sorry that those people lost their lives for this. I know that when I’m out there, I’m probably putting myself in danger but there’s the saying, ‘give me liberty or give me death’ and that’s the saying I stick by,” Edmond said.
As violence escalates elsewhere, legal observers in Polk County said their work is more important than ever.
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