The Winnebago County Sheriff’s Department defended the office’s partnership with ICE in front of a room with not enough seats for attendants at a Judiciary and Public Safety Committee meeting Feb. 2.
Not one speaker during the opportunity for public comments supported the partnership between departments but Winnebago County Sheriff John Matz continued to defend the partnership, claiming that there’s been no changes in operations since first becoming partners 25 years ago, even with Winnebago County and many others across the state joining the 287(g) agreement.
The 287(g) agreement provides the county with the choice of three different strategic models, which Winnebago County declared themselves as users of the Warrant Service Officer Model according to Matz. This means that ICE and local authorities aren’t actively searching for undocumented immigrants, but instead are being turned over to ICE if guilty of criminal charges.
With the community’s outpour of concern about the possibility of ICE operations taking place in Oshkosh and the surrounding cities, UW-Oshkosh students had mixed opinions.
“The possibility of ICE being present in Oshkosh is something that frightens me, not just for myself, but for all UWO students and Oshkosh community members,” Emma Pankow, the president of UWO College Democrats, said.
Pankow said she believes that ICE doesn’t belong anywhere near a college campus.
“College campuses are meant for learning and growing your community,” she said. “College campuses are meant to be safe spaces for all students and ICE having a presence on college campuses completely takes away the safety that campuses are supposed to provide to their students and staff.”
There’s been no official reports of ICE being near UWO or having any presence in the area but Mitchell M, UWO’s Turning Point USA secretary, said he believes that in certain circumstances ICE should be allowed.
“Only in extremely rare situations, ICE shouldn’t come in and check everyone’s papers in every dorm, but if they have legitimate suspicion and a proper warrant, they should be allowed,” M said.
According to the American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin, regardless of immigration status, everyone has constitutional rights; the right to free speech, to have a lawyer in criminal proceedings and the right to be protected from unlawful searches.
When law enforcement, including ICE, asks someone about immigration status, one of the constitutional rights is to remain silent and refuse to answer questions. If able, provide any legal documents that prove immigration status.
Instructions by the Universities of Wisconsin Government Affairs Office released Jan. 27, 2025, said that if ICE shows up at a school or university workplace, students, staff and faculty are recommended to be respectful, ask the agent for their name and to see their government issued badge and then call the Office of General Counsel (OGC) at 608-262-2995.
The instructions also said that people who are questioned by ICE should never give false papers or documentation as it can be used against someone. They also recommend trying to remember important phone numbers of family, friends, work, school and lawyers.
If someone has been arrested or needs to challenge a deportation order, they should not sign without a legal counsel present because of the right to an attorney.
Overall, the Universities of Wisconsin recommended that students, staff and faculty remember to never lie about immigration status as it could land them in worse trouble. They also said that people should never sign any papers that they don’t understand and always talk to a lawyer before signing anything.
If someone is arrested and charged as a criminal, they should always have access to a lawyer.
