How are Republican lawmakers aiding immigrants in deportation crackdown?

By Mina Corpuz | Originally published by Mississippi Today

U.S. Rep. Mike Ezell and Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith offered to help two brothers from the Republic of Congo on the Mississippi Gulf Coast who had an apparent lapse in their student visas and ended up in immigration detention for nine days.

Yet both Trump allies, who are up for re-election this year, also have joined other Republicans in Congress who have voted to provide funding to support a massive deportation effort of people in various stages of the immigration system, including a majority with no criminal records. 

Jeremy Litton, an attorney at Elmore Litton Law firm in Ridgeland, has called the detention of Israel and Max Makoka unimaginable. When he heard that a representative and senator extended their help, Litton saw that as a way for them to placate voters, including those in the Republican Gulf Coast community who spoke up about what happened to the teenagers and rallied behind them. 

“It’s only lip service to constituents,” Litton said. 

Republicans in other parts of the country have exercised pressure in immigration cases. Such pressure may have been a factor that helped the Makokas leave detention and return to their host family in Diamondhead, but most immigrants don’t receive that kind of support. 

U.S. Sen. Roger Wicker, Mississippi’s other Republican senator, received praise in February when he successfully intervened to stop the Department of Homeland Security from converting  a warehouse into an immigrant detention center in north Mississippi. 

But when 13 Democratic members of Congress, including Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, said they wanted the ability to make unplanned visits to detention centers, they had to file a lawsuit. A federal court granted them emergency relief in February. 

Some Mississippi-based immigration attorneys said there could be more of a motive than political gain for why a member of the state’s congressional delegation might extend help in an immigration case. And even when that happens, it’s questionable whether the added help can make a difference in case outcomes, they said

Litton has represented people seeking citizenship, and some of them have been placed in immigration detention and are subject to deportation. 

His former client, Mario Reyes Rodas, had an active work permit and no criminal history. But last summer immigration agents arrested him on Interstate 20 in Rankin County. He had entered the U.S. from Mexico two decades ago and was one of the more than 600 mostly Latino workers detained in the 2019 immigration raids at chicken processing plants in central Mississippi. 

Reyes Rodas is now back in Mexico. He chose to return there after spending nearly a year in a detention center in Louisiana. Litton said Reyes Rodas, who is a father and grandfather, made the decision without a member of Congress offering support to help him remain in the U.S.. 

Barry Walker has 30 years of experience as an immigration attorney, and his firm in Tupelo focuses on employer-based immigration, specifically for workers in the medical field. He said recent immigration policy changes have affected the visas and waivers that his clients are seeking. 

Walker said from time to time, his office asks for assistance from Missisisppi’s senators and representatives, such as when there is difficulty communicating with federal immigration offices. 

The members of Congress can be helpful when reaching out, he said, but generally the federal government can be difficult to communicate with and the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and Immigration and Customs Enforcement don’t always respond to congressional inquiries. 

“They get hundreds of these calls a day,” Walker said about members of Congress reaching out about immigration matters. “(The requests) don’t really carry much weight on a case by case basis.”

Litton and Walker said members of Congress have other ways to help immigrants, especially when it comes to policy and funding. 

ICE is one of the highest funded law enforcement agencies, and its budget has been bolstered through the so-called  One Big Beautiful Bill and the budget reconciliation that last week ended a 76-day partial government shutdown.  

“The power of the purse is just as important,” Litton said. 

Walker, the Tupelo attorney, said members of Congress have also continued to appropriate money to ICE to build large-scale detention centers to house more people, including those who are not involved in criminal matters or are not a security threat. 

“That is just a needless and harsh effort by the government to terrorize the immigrant community of the United States,” Walker said. 

At the end of 2025, a list of nearly two dozen warehouse sites that could be converted into detention centers circulated online, and among those listed was a 8,500-bed facility in the north Mississippi town of Byhalia, which has a population of about 1,400. Once Wicker stepped in, the town was removed as a potential location. 

ICE is expecting to proceed with the overall plan by spending $38.3 billion to buy 16 warehouses across the country and turn them into regional immigration processing centers, the Washington Post reported. 

Walker also said recent immigration policy and detention can have an impact on the economy and industries, especially agriculture and construction. Nationwide, both are industries where immigrants are the majority or make up a portion of the workforce. 

Mississippi is also making efforts to crack down on immigration. 

State lawmakers passed two immigration measures. One law creates a state crime of being in Mississippi without authorization and allows local law enforcement to charge people who are in the state without proper documentation. The other requires local election officials to verify a person’s citizenship if they don’t have a driver’s license when they register to vote. 

Gov. Tate Reeves signed both. They will become law July 1. 

Litton said his law firm may take on some of the state felony immigration cases because it also handles criminal matters. 

“It goes to show who we are as a people,” he said about the new state immigration laws. 

This article was originally published by Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Source: Original Article