Amaad Rivera
State Policy Director for U.S. Senator Ed Markey
“Ultimately, [the Senator] understands that our country is stronger and better when we are building a welcoming place and a pathway to allow people who are seeking refuge to also find safety here.”
Amaad Rivera is the State Policy Director for U.S. Senator Ed Markey. He describes his job in part as, “To help ensure that individuals have access and support in their federal issues.” We asked Rivera if the Senator gets a lot of communication about immigration. He responded, “Absolutely. Particularly this year, obviously in 2017. We've been dealing with immigration reform as an office for a very long time.” He added, “Immigration is incredibly important to the Senator; and we've seen that issue definitely come to the forefront under this particular administration.” Furthermore, he stated that the Senator believes immigration reform is necessary. His exact words were,
The Senator believes that the immigration system is somewhat broken, is broken, and that we don't have a strong functioning system to ensure that people have a strong and clear pathway to citizenship, that we're dealing with refugees and immigrants and asylees in a way that is humane, safe, and protected, as well as building safety for those when we can, and ensuring that we are not only supporting the best and the brightest in our own country but that we are building a community that allows us to attract the best and the brightest talent from all over the world, so that we’re making the U.S. stronger.
He continues, “Ultimately, [the Senator] understands that our country is stronger and better when we are building a welcoming place and a pathway to allow people who are seeking refuge to also find safety here”. Rivera adds,
The Senator has been someone who has attended lots of naturalization ceremonies for those who are becoming citizens… Ultimately, this office believes that we want people to be welcomed into a community in which you can build the dreams that you want for you and your family… We want to create not only a community but a country that lives up to those ideals: that we all can be able to build the best on the opportunity that we’re given and build upon those [opportunities] so that we can make our country better, our families better, ourselves better.
To follow up on the idea of communities supporting New Americans, we asked about Senator Markey’s views on sanctuary cities. Rivera remarked that,
The Senator has come out very strongly in saying that there should not be any repercussions for sanctuary cities being sanctuary cities. Ultimately, those cities and towns have the right to decide how they're going to operationalize their police departments and [handle] their relationship with immigration… The Senator signed on to legislation to ensure that cities that have identified as sanctuary cities have the right to do so and there should not be any federal repercussions around funding related to those things.
From there we queried Rivera about the Senator’s views on Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), to which Rivera responded,
ICE is a very big federal agency that has lots of elements. And while we're in a time where we’re talking about more controversial parts of those elements, like potential deportation, there are other things that ICE is responsible for… Ultimately, the Senator wants to support federal agencies that are doing their job and ensure that they are doing their job well. We want to make sure that we aren't putting undue pressures on communities that are unnecessary. And we wouldn't want any federal agency to over reach in a way that isn't supportive and building on the community’s strengths.
When asked specifically about how much activity ICE has in Western Massachusetts communities, Rivera responded, “We don't necessarily monitor [ICE], and so we haven’t asked for a report.” He added, “If there was a request by constituency... we potentially could ask them [and] see what they respond.”