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Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds announced Wednesday that members of the state’s National Guard have been prepped to work alongside ICE, citing a mutual aid authorization from the Pentagon reported by the Quad City Times.
Reynolds, a Republican, said that no mission directive has been received from Arlington but that the Iowa National Guard stands ready to deploy members to assist in clerical and administrative functions.
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Reynolds told reporters at an appearance in Cedar Rapids that she was one of several governors privy to a recent call with Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in which the idea of state militias assisting with detention and deportation operations was discussed, according to the Des Moines Register.
“What we really looked at was logistics and processing is probably the way that we would look to help from a state perspective,” Reynolds said, according to the paper.
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She added that servicemember figures and the number of states potentially involved have yet to be determined.
“We have said that we would step up and help and nothing has been finalized yet. But we’re … looking into helping in some ways that we can,” she said in comments aired on KCCI.
Escucha Mi Voz, a faith-based, immigrant-led community organization, told the network that any deployment of the National Guard against the immigrant community is “morally indefensible and risks widespread violations of civil liberties and constitutional rights.”
The National Guards of five other states – Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Georgia and Florida – also received directives to help ICE conduct “alien processing,” according to a memo obtained by The New York Times.
