The roofers arrived before 7 a.m. Six men and women, Spanish speakers. They came to our Albany home this August morning to replace our leaky roof.
My wife and I watched as they ripped off shingles, cut out rotten boards, and carried 4-by-8 foot sheets of plywood up ladders on their backs. By midday, temperatures would hit the upper 80s. That meant the temperature on the roof would rise somewhere between 100 and 130 degrees.
The foreman said, “Most contractors won’t do roofs. The work’s just too hard.”
The crew ate their lunch under a tree. From tin trays, they scooped out what looked like a home-cooked meal. We baked them chocolate chip cookies.
Midafternoon, the doorbell rang. A roofer said, “Someone is taking pictures.”
A white man in a black van had pulled over, took photos of the workers, made a call, and then drove away. They assumed he was with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
But after half an hour in our kitchen, they wanted to get back to work. If they finished our roof today, they could start another in the morning. That meant more money.
Meanwhile, we contacted the Capital Region Sanctuary Coalition. Two of their volunteers showed up. From our lawn, we watched for ICE vehicles, bland-colored SUVs with dark, opaque windows. Looking at the roofers again, we saw just how visible and vulnerable they were.
The crew finished at 8 p.m. Before they left, we handed them small cards listing their rights. They could refuse officers from entering their homes unless they came with a warrant signed by a judge. If pulled over, they didn’t have to answer questions.
One roofer asked: What if agents broke their car window, which had happened in one confrontation? Another roofer mentioned a relative who had lived in this country for 30 years. About to get his citizenship, ICE deported him. We all understood: In these times, under this administration, rights were not guaranteed.
I learned that in July, ICE agents had “flooded the zone” in Albany.
The Sanctuary Coalition documented at least 15 new ICE vehicles on the streets. I saw one of their new SUVs drive by.
The slogan on its tailgate?
“Protect the homeland.”
On one single day, Aug. 10th, the Sanctuary Coalition counted 33 immigrants detained.
That was more than the total in any single month before this summer. In the city newspaper, I read about one immigrant family who had been detained on that day.
A man from Ecuador, also a roofer, was driving to work with his wife and two young boys. He saw he was being followed and turned back to his apartment building. Five ICE cars were behind him. The family had applied for asylum. But they had withdrawn their application after ICE agents began detaining asylum seekers at required check-ins. The mother and the two boys are now locked up in Texas. The father is detained in western New York.
With the article, there’s a photograph of the family. It shows the four of them in a church. Lit candles, stained glass, an altar. They’re all dressed up. The youngest wears a white tie and jacket. The wife is named. She’s Veronica Saquillo. The husband, Kevin Ushiña. We wondered if he was one of the men who had fixed our roof.
When I tell our friends and neighbors what happened with the roofers that day - and about the ramp up of ICE incursions in Albany - most of them are startled and distressed.
I know what they’re thinking, because I thought it too: These are the kinds of things that happened on the news in cities like L.A., Chicago, or Minneapolis. No one wants to believe that it could happen in their hometown. Or worse yet, that it already has.
Dennis Gaffney, a freelance journalist and writer based in Albany, New York, has written articles for publications such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Mother Jones, as well as web content for the PBS series Antiques Roadshow and American Experience. He’s also published three history books. (See dennisgaffney.wordpress.com)
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