SEQUIM — Stop the Checkpoints staged its second rally in as many weeks on Saturday at the corner of Washington Street and Sequim Avenue.
The group is protesting Border Patrol activity on the North Olympic Peninsula.
Jose Antonio Hernandez, a legal immigrant, and Daniel Rodriguez, an illegal immigrant, both of Sequim, were detained Jan. 30 and taken to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Tacoma, prompting a small protest last week that drew four people with signs.
This week’s demonstration drew 60 people, Stop the Checkpoints coordinator Lois Danks estimated.
“We picketed because Daniel and Tony were taken away,” Danks said.
Federal authorities in Tacoma released Hernandez on Monday, citing uncertainty over whether he qualifies for deportation.
He had not been told of a change in his status by Saturday, said his fiancee, Tiffany Janssen of Sequim.
Hernandez, 28, who immigrated from Mexico, has held permanent resident status since 2000.
He did not have his green card with him when he was detained.
Rodriguez, 18, a Mexican national, was determined by the Border Patrol to be in the United States illegally, said Michael Bermudez, Border Patrol spokesman, last week.
He remained in the Tacoma detention center last week, pending a deportation hearing.
Hernandez and Rodriguez were traveling in a private truck when they were stopped by Border Patrol agents.
The Border Patrol arrested Hernandez because he had been convicted of either an aggravated felony or a crime of moral turpitude, which qualifies him for deportation, Bermudez said last week.
Hernandez was once convicted of reckless endangerment, which may qualify as an aggravated felony, and possession of a drug without a prescription in 2003, said Lorie Dankers, spokeswoman for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.
ICE officials were investigating whether either qualified as violations of conditions placed on him as a permanent resident, she said last week.
Protest next week
Next Saturday, Stop the Checkpoints plans a protest at the Olympic Bus Line stop near Fat Smitty’s restaurant in Discovery Bay from 1:30 p.m. to 2:30 p.m.
The bus is scheduled to stop there at 2:15 p.m., Danks said.
Border Patrol agents have been reported stopping Olympic Bus Line buses.
Last summer, Border Patrol agents operated roadblocks north of Forks and near the Hood Canal Bridge to check identification.
Danks’ group is also planning a Women’s Day march on March 7 in Sequim.
The Border Patrol’s mission, Bermudez has said, is to maintain “operational control of our nation’s borders.”
