Friday, March 28, 2025
Some Freeport neighborhoods are grappling with fear and uncertainty amid changes in federal immigration policy and Nassau County’s decision to allow county police to work with Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.
According to the National Immigration Law Center, on his first day in office, President Trump signed executive orders calling for, among other measures:
-A recommitment to mass detention of undocumented immigrants.
-Potential punishment of municipalities that act as “sanctuaries” for them.
-Authorization for local municipalities to act as immigration enforcement agents.
This final point has caused alarm among many who wonder whether local governments such as the villages of Freeport, Hempstead and Westbury and area school districts might cooperate with ICE.
County Executive Bruce Blakeman signed an agreement with the Trump administration on Feb. 4 that enabled him to deputize Nassau County Police Department officers to carry out immigration enforcement in tandem with the federal agency.
Blakeman’s policy has received bipartisan support. Newly minted U.S. Rep. Laura Gillen, a Democrat from Rockville Centre, issued a statement on Feb. 6, saying, “Violent criminals with no legal right to be here should be deported in accordance with the law. Nassau County detectives now being able to work directly with ICE agents on targeted enforcement against known noncitizen criminals will help keep Long Islanders safe.”
Janna Rodriguez, founder of the Innovative Daycare Corp. owner in Freeport, described the growing fear among some local families.
“One of the concerns and issues that we’ve had within the child care sector is the fact that there may be children whose parents may be undocumented, or one parent’s undocumented,” Rodriguez said, “and the terror of breaking up those families is where it lies.”
Jasmine Peña, a Freeport resident, noted that local Hispanic businesses, particularly those on Main Street, have seen a downturn in profits. “A lot of their customers, where they’re, like, illegal immigrants, they haven’t come around. They’re scared,” Peña said, adding that the fear has extended into the health care sector. “My cousin, who is a health manager, says they have incoming patients who are terrified to go and see a doctor because of their legal status,” she said. “So they have a very low turnout as well.”
Schools have also felt the impact. Her friends in education, Peña said, have told her that attendance among undocumented students, and even those who have benefited from the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy, has declined.
Maria Jordan-Awalom, a Freeport resident who is active in the community confirmed the rising angst. “We have noticed a shift, especially this year, within our school community, with our students and our families,” she said. “Once this statement came out from the police department, right from Nassau County P.D. and the county executive, I think it put a little bit more fear in our community.”
The Freeport School District sent out a letter on Jan. 27, reaffirming its commitment to protecting students’ rights to an education regardless of their immigration status. It emphasized that requests from ICE would be treated the same way as requests from local law enforcement, and would be reviewed by the district’s legal counsel, and that only requests based on subpoenas from federal or magistrate judges would be considered, again following a review by the district’s attorneys.
The fact that the village Police Department operates separately from the NCPD also raises questions about enforcement policies.
Mayor Robert Kennedy maintained that the village would follow state law. “We’ll handle everything in accordance with the law, whatever New York state comes down and tells us what the regulations are,” Kennedy said told the Herald on Monday, Feb. 10.
Meanwhile, local sentiment appears to be overwhelmingly opposed to an increased ICE presence in the community.
Resident Jose Cuevas expressed concerns about racial profiling. “Freeport is a community that has a high concentration of Spanish speakers, and just seeing the history that ICE has had is quite concerning,” he said, citing reports of ICE agents targeting Spanish-speaking U.S. citizens. “The biggest fear now is Laura Gillen, our representative that just got elected, stating publicly that she supports Bruce Blakeman’s policy with ICE, which is another concern.”
Cuevas noted a Facebook post by Gillen stating her support for the new policy, which as of press time had drawn nearly 100 comments, the vast majority of them negative.
“We should be focusing on ensuring that law enforcement protects everybody equally, without discrimination and without fear,” he said.
Blakeman, responding to rumors that the combined efforts of ICE and the NCPD would range beyond apprehending criminals, posted a video his Facebook page on Feb. 6 titled, “A Message to the Hispanic Community of Nassau County.” In it, he emphasized that the initiative is focused strictly on removing criminals who are in the U.S. illegally, and that it would not target law-abiding undocumented residents.
He assured the public that there would be no raids on “schools, churches or communities in Nassau County” and that people would not be stopped for random immigration status checks.
Blakeman also stressed that victims and witnesses of crimes, and those who call 911, would not be questioned about their immigration status.
A representative of Gillen provided a statement to the Herald addressing the concerns of her constituents about her support for Blakeman’s proposal.
“Compelling ICE to work with local law enforcement means local officials will know when ICE officials are showing up and what they are doing,” Gillen said. “It makes the process more transparent and helps ensure that federal immigration enforcement is targeted and properly carried out. The President has vowed to prioritize deporting known violent criminals, which the majority of Americans agree with to keep us safe. This local-federal coordination is a way to ensure that is the focus.”
