Largest US immigration raids in a decade net 680 arrests in Mississippi

MORTON, Mississippi - US immigration officials raided seven Mississippi chicken processing plants on Wednesday, arresting 680 mostly Latino workers in the largest workplace sting in at least a decade.

The raids, planned months ago, happened just hours before US President Donald Trump visited El Paso, Texas, the majority-Latino border city where a man linked to an online screed about a "Hispanic invasion" was charged in a shooting that left 22 people dead.

"On a day when we seek unifying words and acts to heal the nation's broken heart, President Trump allows so many families and communities to be torn apart," said Angelica Salas, executive director of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights.

About 600 agents from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, fanned out across the plants operated by five companies, surrounding the perimeters to prevent workers from fleeing.

In Morton, about 65 kilometers east of the capital of Jackson, workers filled three buses - two for men and one for women - at a Koch Foods plant.

Those arrested were taken to a military hangar to be processed for immigration violations. About 70 family, friends and residents waved goodbye and shouted, "Let them go! Let them go!" Later, two more buses arrived.

Mississippi is the nation's fifth-largest chicken-producing state and the plants' tough processing jobs have mainly been filled by Latino immigrants eager to take whatever work they can get. Chicken plants dominate the economies of Morton and other small towns east of Jackson.

Matthew Albence, ICE's acting director, told The Associated Press in an interview on Wednesday in the town of Pearl, just down the road from the Koch plant, that the raids could be the largest-ever workplace operation in any single state. Asked about their coinciding with Trump's visit to El Paso, Albence responded, "This is a long-term operation that's been going on." He said raids are "racially neutral" and based on evidence of illegal residency.

The companies involved could be charged with knowingly hiring workers who are in the country illegally and will be scrutinized for tax, document and wage fraud, Albence said.

Bill Chandler, executive director of the Mississippi Immigrant Rights Alliance, called the "terrible" raids "another effort to drive Latinos out of Mississippi."

"This is the same thing that Trump is doing at the border with the Border Patrol," he said, referring to the increased crackdown on migrants coming into the US.

In a diplomatic note published by its foreign ministry on Wednesday, the Mexican government said it wanted US authorities to share all information on the El Paso case to "determine if there are other individuals and potential organizations of 'white supremacy' seeking to put our community in danger in the United States".

Agencies