Boston Takes Bold Step to Track Immigration Arrests

In a striking escalation of its resistance to recent federal immigration crackdowns, Boston Mayor Michelle Wu announced today that the city will begin filing regular Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to the Department of Homeland Security. The goal: to obtain the names and statuses of individuals detained by federal agents on city streets.
“It’s basic information in a country of laws and due process that we are owed as a society — to know when someone was arrested, who, why, where,” Wu said at a City Hall press conference flanked by State Senator Lydia Edwards and City Councilor Enrique Pepén, along with local immigrant-rights advocates, according to Universal Hub.
The city is also reaching out to foreign consulates based in Boston to help identify nationals who may have been detained without notice, as community groups and families scramble to locate their loved ones.
Wu emphasized that families deserve more than silence. “Information is the least government can provide to the families of detainees,” reports Universal Hub.
The effort reflects growing frustration in Boston’s immigrant communities.
Lenita Reason of the Brazilian Workers Center pointed to a recent incident in Allston-Brighton in which a man on his way to deliver rent money was picked up by agents. “We don’t want to wait two weeks, three weeks,” she said, simply to learn where someone is being held, according to Universal Hub. Her organization helped the man’s wife and children obtain food, but couldn’t cover rent. “We don’t have money just sitting around,” she added.
Despite federal pressure, Wu made clear that Boston will not be intimidated. “My advice to Tom Homan and ICE is to take a time out, to reassess what you are doing and how you are doing it,” she said, taking aim at recent rhetoric from federal officials demanding she stay silent, Universal Hub reported. Offering what she called “a little friendly advice from the safest major city in the country,” Wu said real security comes not from “fear mongering, hatred and ‘secret police’ tactics” but from trust and collaboration — the kind built between Boston Police and the communities they serve.
“The American people are not stupid,” she added, according to Universal Hub. “No one is buying the line that these secret-police tactics are making communities safer, no one is buying this is making cities safer.”
State Senator Lydia Edwards drew on her personal and historical ties to Boston to frame the moment as part of a broader struggle. Boston, she said, “has long been a city of immigrants… who became incredibly patriotic citizens,” including some who sent their children to the military to defend the nation. “They are sending their children to die for this country,” she said, her voice cracking as she denounced what she described as a federal return to “the Dred Scott era,” Universal Hub reported.
Edwards, whose family history in the U.S. dates back to 1818 and includes ancestors brought here as slaves, said the Black community knows all too well how power can erase identity. “The first thing they do when they take away your rights is deny that you exist,” she warned, according to Universal Hub. But she issued a firm challenge to those she sees as pushing the country backward: “They don’t know our strength, and we are tough as hell. We are a city of neighborhoods and we stick together.” In a sharp message to federal authorities, she added, “You hit us, we hit back harder.”
City Councilor Enrique Pepén, who represents Hyde Park, Roslindale, and Mattapan, shared a recent example of local solidarity. When news spread that ICE was operating on Washington Street in Roslindale — a neighborhood with a large Dominican population — volunteers mobilized within hours. “Roslindale Is For Everyone,” a group formed during the Trump administration, deployed 20 people to alert businesses and keep watch at the Sumner School to ensure children got home safely. “Our people deserve better,” Pepén said, according to Universal Hub.
With a new strategy centered on transparency, documentation, and community defense, Boston’s leaders say they will not stand by silently. As federal raids intensify, the city appears committed to fighting back — one FOIA request at a time.