A Haitian community leader on Maryland’s Eastern Shore has issued an urgent warning that Haitian residents are being swept up by immigration agents, saying in an emotional public letter that his community is “under attack by ICE.”
The warning, first reported by the Salisbury Daily Times, comes as separate news accounts describe a sharp rise in arrests of Haitians in the area following the end of Temporary Protected Status.
The warning came from Roosevelt Toussaint, senior pastor of the Word of Life Center Church and executive director of the Haitian Development Center of Delmarva, who posted the letter to the center’s Facebook page. According to the Salisbury Daily Times, Toussaint wrote that Haitian residents of Wicomico County are facing what he called “illegal arrests,” and that many of those being taken are people who applied for asylum and hold five-year employment authorization cards allowing them to work legally in the United States.
Toussaint described people being “kidnapped, arrested, and detained by ICE without any warrant” while driving with passengers in their cars, according to his letter as published by the Salisbury Daily Times.
He framed the arrests as targeting people who have committed no crimes, writing that they fled persecution, work, raise families, start businesses and pay taxes.
He said the enforcement crosses party lines, calling it “pure cruelty and harassment.
” Many Haitian families, he said, are now shutting themselves inside their homes out of fear of being detained and deported to Haiti, which he described as a country overwhelmed by gang violence and without a government able to protect them.
Toussaint’s account tracks with reporting from other outlets. NBC News reported on Aug. 14 that ICE was ramping up arrests and deportations of Haitians in Salisbury after the end of TPS, and described a 17-year-old girl who said she was driving home from a grocery store with her father when two vehicles boxed them in and about half a dozen ICE officers surrounded the car demanding their immigration status.
The Baltimore Sun reported the following day that Haitian poultry workers were being detained near Eastern Shore workplaces, quoting community advocate Monica Brooks, who said agents were “scooping people up in droves.” Salisbury is home to an estimated 2,000 Haitian Americans, a community that grew largely around the region’s poultry-processing plants.
The arrests follow the federal termination of TPS for Haiti, which took effect July 27 and stripped protections from hundreds of thousands of Haitians nationwide.
Many of those Toussaint describes are asylum seekers whose cases remain pending even as the wider crackdown intensifies.
Federal and local officials have defended stepped-up immigration enforcement.
Wicomico County entered a partnership with ICE under the federal 287(g) program, and Rep. Andy Harris praised the county in 2025 for the arrangement, which trains deputies to transfer people from the county jail to federal custody and which he described as a way to keep communities safe by removing people with criminal records.
That jail-based program is distinct from the roadside and workplace arrests that Toussaint and other accounts describe, and the community leaders speaking out say those being detained have no criminal records.
In his letter, Toussaint appealed to the community for help. According to the Salisbury Daily Times, he asked for prayers and support, requested assistance buying food and toiletries for affected families, and urged people to contact U.S. senators and members of Congress to act on the detainees’ behalf.
https://ctninfo.com/?p=44270&preview=true
Sources: Delmarva Now | The Daily Times
