A public forum is planned Thursday at the State House on Haverhill Rep. Andy X. Vargas’s PROTECT Act, which would place limits on U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement actions in the state.
Thursday’s hearing, however, involves only members of the state House of Representatives and not their Senate counterparts on the Legislature’s Joint Committee on Public Safety and Homeland Security. Vargas, chairman of the Legislature’s Black and Latino Caucus recently participated in a discussion led by Congresswoman Lori Trahan in Haverhill following the ICE shooting deaths of Alex Pretti and Renee Good.
“Keep people safe, uphold the Constitution and make sure our public institutions are places that people can trust,” Vargas said in January of the bill’s purposes.
As WHAV previously reported, the bill restricts police from asking about a person’s immigration status, requires written support from a judge if it is important to prove a state crime, restricts officers or employees of a law enforcement agency from sharing non-public personal information or giving advance notice of a person’s release if is timed to allow federal civil immigration enforcement action and bans future creation or renewal of existing agreements that allow local police to carry out federal immigration officers’ responsibilities.
The so-called “hybrid public forum” is being organized to solicit written and oral testimony on the bill, whose long name is “An act promoting rule of law, oversight, trust and equal constitutional treatment. The House chair of the joint committee is Rep. Dan Cahill and the Senate co-chair is Sen. John Cronin.
Commonwealth Beacon recently reported the state Senate did not follow the house in sending the bill to committee, “leaving the measure in legislative limbo.” It added, “A spokesperson for Senate President Karen Spilka declined to comment on the bill’s committee status.”
The public forum is Thursday, Feb. 26, at 11 a.m., in State House Rooms A-1 and A-2.