State and city leaders gathered in City Hall Friday to pledge a commitment to justice for all amid heightened awareness of ICE actions since President Donald Trump took office last week.
“Our priority is to uphold the law while treating all individuals with dignity and respect,” Pennsylvania Sen. Sharif Street said in a news conference announcing the Friday, Jan. 31, 2025, news conference. “We will not waver in our responsibility to protect all community members, regardless of their background.”
The event came after Republican President Trump signed some executive orders targeting immigrants and the birthright to citizenship.
“My message to folks is real simple, no executive order can end due process and no executive order can end your citizenship, birthright citizenship,” Street said Friday morning. “No one person through the stroke of a pen can change due process or people’s fundamental rights.”
Street was joined by fellow Democrats, Philadelphia Councilmember Rue Landau and Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner and others for the event that was held in the wake of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents being seen on video raiding a car wash in Philadelphia’s Juniata Park neighborhood earlier in the week.
The officials stressed that the City of Brotherly Love remains an inclusive place where they won’t actively separate families.
“The law is meant to protect, not punish those who seek safety,” Landau said. “We are not a city that tears communities apart.”
Street said that people in Philadelphia can still go see a doctor and send kids to school without fear of being turned into immigration officers.
However, “if you are a criminal, you’ve murdered someone, you will be dealt with for murdering someone regardless of your documentation status,” Street said.
District Attorney Larry Krasner said he will be monitoring ICE’s processes, saying he will not get involved if they are in accordance with the law. “My job is to enforce the law,” Krasner said, while throwing insults at Trump.
“We all accept and recognize that ICE is going to do what it is legally and constitutionally entitled to do,” Krasner said. “As a law enforcement office we would not interfere with that.”
Krasner, however, said that any ICE agent who uses unnecessary force will be prosecuted.
“If any ICE agent or any of and Proud Boy who thinks hate crimes are cool, that ‘I can get away with anything’ because there is a king in D.C., no you can’t, that’s not how it’s going to work,” Krasner said. “If you are inclined to use (immigrants) as your scapegoat, harm them, be cruel to them, you better do it within the law, and if you don’t try me!”
The gathering was meant to send a strong message to marginalized groups living in fear that they have rights, Landau said.
The notable absentee at this meeting was Mayor Cherelle Parker, who has mostly remained out of the spotlight on immigration issues over the past couple weeks.
The latest ICE arrest figures date back to January 29, 2025 , showing that 1,016 arrests were made just on that day, of which 814 were admitted to a detention center. This is nationwide and is not limited to the Philadelphia region.
Source: www.nbcphiladelphia.com…