Photo: Chaiel Schaffel/WBZ NewsRadio
FRAMINGHAM, Mass. (WBZ NewsRadio) – The most common language on store signs and windows in downtown Framingham is English, but only by a hair. Brazilian Portuguese makes up the difference, courtesy of the city’s burgeoning Brazilian immigrant community, one of the largest in the country. Right now, those shops sit mostly empty. Many of their usual customers are laying low as an ICE arrest crackdown has rocked the streets here over the last two weeks.
“We don’t know who they are.”
Liliane Costa, who runs the Brazilian American Center (BRACE), said the wave of arrests and deportations have shaken everyone in the tight-knit community. Arrests have made the news all over Metro West and Greater Boston, including a Waltham resident detained in the street while the 12-year-old he was with looked on. Costa said a similar incident happened in Framingham days ago.
The rapid nature of the detainments means that feeling of unease extends to people who are in the country with visas, Green Cards – and citizens. As Costa spoke to WBZ NewsRadio, she took a card out of her wallet and tapped it on the desk: her U.S. Passport card, proving that she is a citizen.
“I never carried this with me before…but now, this is with me all the time,” she said.
She said part of the fear gripping the Brazilian community is that there has not been a real way to even make sure the officers are authentic, and not impostors simply kidnapping their friends and neighbors. According to her, they have often refused to communicate, show a warrant or badge, or uncover their faces.
“They are using masks, they are using vests with ICE letters on them, but we don’t know who they are,” she said. She pointed out the vests could be easily faked.
WBZ NewsRadio reached out to ICE’s Boston office with those claims, and did not get a response back. However, widely publicized video and photos of numerous arrests in Massachusetts and across the nation in recent weeks suggest at least the masking tactics are commonplace. WBZ NewsRadio could not verify the claims about agents refusing to show warrants or badges.
BRACE is a non-profit that helps recent immigrants navigate the complex visa and heath care systems in the United States. Costa said 90% of the people set to show up to the center for important appointments have been no-shows in the last two weeks. She said many immigrants here are considering leaving the country, or were at least hesitant to go anywhere that they might encounter federal agents. Even she, with a fluent understanding of the immigration system, is hesitant to go to airports and travel out of the country, on the chance she isn’t let back in. Costa has lived in the United States for 27 years – but recently, she said that hasn’t meant much.
“…I will always be an immigrant,” she said.
Traffic Slows Downtown
WBZ NewsRadio visited Framingham and spoke with a number of Brazilian shop-keepers and others. At around lunchtime, most restaurants were virtually empty, as were the streets.
“I think there’s a possibility I’ll close my store,” one owner said. “Framingham, and in specific downtown center, survives by immigrant people.” He said through he was an American citizen, several of his friends had been arrested and taken in over the last few days.
“People are very scared. Always we’ve seen the action from ICE, but…never like this,” he continued. Through translator apps and in-person interviews, others described an atmosphere of intense fear and trepidation, the likes of which they hadn’t ever seen before.
The acute lack of business adds in another complication for the community, which took root in Framingham in the early 1980s and has grown to enormous proportions. As early as 2009, some census tracts were up to 60% Brazilian. The city hosts one of the largest Brazilian communities in the country by percentage. As those immigrants contemplate self-deporting, Costa warned Framingham at large and Massachusetts could see ill effects if the community feels it needs to uproot itself.
“The kind of jobs these people do… it will be so difficult to find people to do those jobs,” said Costa. “Landscapers, house cleaners….I think it will be very difficult to find people to do that.”
WBZ’s Chaiel Schaffel (@CschaffelWBZ) reports: