1/x I want to explain as plainly as I can why Americans should be panicking about the fact that border patrol and ICE forces seem to be "policing" the streets of Portland. It's a personal story about why experience with thee officers.
2/x Before becoming an American citizen, I was a permanent resident. When I would travel overseas, I'd often come back through Miami airport because I'd visit my birth country. Inevitably, once I reached the customs officer, I'd get pulled out and taken to a back room.
3/x If you've never been pulled out of line at customs, here's what happens: they take your papers and they take you. They don't tell you why and if you're traveling with someone they don't tell them why.
4/x You can't talk to your companion & not allowed to give them anything. The room they take you to has chairs facing a glass-enclosed partition where officers are working. There are people in the room; some have been there a while; some have kids; the kids are crying.
5/x You are not allowed to talk to others in the room; you are not allowed to get up from your chair; you are not allowed to talk to any officer unless spoken to. You may not ask why you are in the room or how long it will take.
6/x You may be in the room for hours or for a short while; you can't tell because you can't ask. If you're lucky and your papers are in order (as I was) then you never find out what happens if you get taken "somewhere else."
7/x Once whoever has your papers are done with them, they come and tell you you're free to go and take you back out to the main part of the airport. They don't tell you why you were held and you may not ask either; if you try to push it, they signal to you they'll take you back.
8/x After a few times going through this, the typical wait for me was somewhere around 45 minutes. The worst was one time I was traveling alone (single Haitian guy; Miami airport; green card). The plane landed at 2PM. I left the airport close to midnight.
9/x If you're traveling with someone, your job when you reunite with them is to calm them and ask them not to make a fuss and not to demand to speak to anyone because you've been in the room and you don't want to go back.
10/x It was almost better when you were traveling alone because you could sit in that room and not worry about how anxious the person outside was about your safety. After a few times, you sat back and waited.
11/x This happened virtually every time I came through Miami and no matter how bad it was it was the least bad thing that could have happened. All of it was legal because these officers are trained to deal with those who, while at the airport, have ZERO rights to speak of.
12/x The federal forces patrolling Portland right now come from the same set of officers that dealt with me at the airport. I had no power to control what happened to me even though I'd graduated from law school, clerked for a federal judge, and worked at a large firm.
13/13 Reading recent public radio stories about the Portland arrests, the way these folks were taken and then released with no explanation sounded an awful lot like my experience in that Miami airport backroom? Are we sure, American citizens are prepared for this?
