U.S. Senator Patty Murray is taking a hard swing at Immigration and Customs Enforcement over a Seattle deportation case that has jumped from government paperwork to street-level tension in West Seattle. What started as one arrest has quickly turned into the neighborhood’s latest flashpoint over immigration enforcement.
Murray Says ICE Rushed Him Out Of Washington
In a statement from Senator Patty Murray, the office says Eduardo Aguirre Esparza was detained last Thursday, taken to the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma, then put on a plane to Texas at 2 a.m. on Saturday. Murray says Esparza has lived in Seattle for 23 years, is married to an American citizen, runs a remodeling company, and has no criminal history, and she labeled the deportation push “plain sick.”
West Seattle Blog reports that the case is already fueling neighborhood chatter around Morgan Junction and Juneau Street, with residents putting up signs and texting around photos of suspected ICE activity. The outlet also relayed a reader’s account of an apparent ICE arrest near 41st and Juneau, a sign of how quickly one family’s legal fight has rippled across the community.
Murray’s office says it is pressing the Department of Homeland Security to return Esparza to Washington so he can have due process and access to counsel. That demand lands in a city where earlier Arbor Heights coverage of an ICE traffic stop found that even unconfirmed ICE sightings were already rattling West Seattle residents.
