As ICE crackdowns roil California communities, some Republican lawmakers have urged President Donald Trump to scale back detention of immigrants without criminal records and pursue immigration reform.

Last month six state lawmakers signed onto a letter by Senator Suzette Martinez Valladares, R-Santa Clarita, urging Trump to focus immigration raids on violent criminals and to modernize the immigration process.

“We see two overriding issues that need to be addressed,” the lawmakers wrote. “The first is that serious and violent criminals are in this country illegally. The second and related issue concerns raids targeting violent criminals, which have resulted in non-criminal migrants being swept up as well.”

ICE raids on farms, construction sites, restaurants and hotels are affecting communities and businesses in their districts, they stated. A raid at Buona Forchetta restaurant in South Park last month showed how amped up raids are stoking fear and disruption in San Diego.

Pedro Rios, director of the U.S.-Mexico Border Program for the American Friends Service Committee, told me the letter reflects growing worry about the consequences of sweeping immigration action.

“Some people in the Republican base are concerned the aggressive enforcement measures are affecting people who are workers,” he said.

The lawmakers say Trump is responding and point to his recent comments suggesting a potential carve-out for farm and restaurant workers.

“The president has made it very clear that he is not looking for amnesty but a path to a workforce program for immigrants,” Valladares told me. “We’re anticipating seeing an executive order. We’re hopeful that Congress will act on this.”

Trump’s position has vacillated, however, leaving farmers and other business owners uncertain about his plans.

In June Trump said, “our farmers are being hurt badly” and promised help. But days later, the Department of Homeland Security said the raids would continue. Later Trump again said he didn’t want to hurt farmers and “floated a vague effort to ‘let the farmers take responsibility’ for their workers,” the New York Times reported.

Rios said the need to create legal pathways for people to live and work in the United States is a “common denominator” across political parties and organizations. “There’s a generalized understanding that immigration policies need to be reformed,” he said.

However, he cautioned against any plan to offer job programs without worker protections and the chance to earn legal residency.

“The question comes in whether the U.S. would only want workers to produce for them but doesn’t recognize them as human beings with the right to live in the United States,” Rios said.

The Republicans’ letter asked Trump to “modernize our immigration process to allow non-criminal undocumented immigrants with longstanding ties to our communities a path toward legal status” and expand the H-2A and H-2B visa programs, which authorize temporary work in agriculture and other sectors.

Valladares said the California lawmakers didn’t make more specific recommendations because they expect the White House and Congress to hash out the details for work programs in the agriculture, hospitality and construction sectors.

“Having workforce programs specifically modernized for those industries would be a phenomenal starting point,” she said.

Republican lawmakers also argue that California’s sanctuary law, which limits coordination between local police and immigration enforcement, leads ICE and Border Patrol agents to round up people without criminal records when they enter neighborhoods seeking immigrants wanted on criminal cases.

“Until California Democrat politicians stop protecting criminal illegal immigrants and repeal their dangerous sanctuary state law, we should be prepared to see more collateral arrests in our communities,” said Senate Minority Leader Brian Jones, a signatory to the letter.

Jones’ bill to limit state sanctuary protections failed in the legislature this year.

Although Trump has pledged to focus on deporting immigrants with criminal records, that appears at odds with his vow to enact mass deportations.

As of last month, the vast majority of people being held at Otay Mesa Detention Center did not have criminal records. ICE figures from June 23 show that 125 out of 1,349 people detained at Otay Mesa have a felony or misdemeanor conviction on their record, while the remaining 1,224 are listed as “no ICE threat level.”

A national analysis of ICE detentions by the Cato Institute paints a similar picture. It looked at nonpublic data and found that 65 percent of people that ICE detained as of June 14 had no criminal record at all, and 93 percent had no convictions for violent offenses.

Rios said the Trump administration has blurred those distinctions by branding immigrants broadly as criminals, and said the tactics being used to apprehend them are inhumane, regardless of their criminal history.

San Diego Mystery Author Tackles Bias and Perception

Imagine being held in a Customs office at an airport because your accent doesn’t seem to match your American passport. That’s the opening scene of “Threads of Deception,” the debut novel by San Diego author Elle Jauffret.

“The social issue and political theme centers around how power, perception and bias affect access to justice and belonging in American society,” Jauffret, who is a French-born American citizen, told me.

Jauffret, an attorney and author, wanted to raise issues of identity and language within a mystery. Her lead character Claire Fontaine, also an attorney, develops what sounds like a French accent after surviving head trauma in a bombing of her law firm.

“My main character is a former criminal attorney, has foreign accent syndrome, and is continually underestimated,” Jauffret said.

Claire returns to her hometown in San Diego County from Washington D.C. after recuperating from her injuries, and finds a friend murdered. She deploys her investigative skills to discover the killer, while facing mistrust and bias, in a story that combines political intrigue, fashion and gourmet cuisine.

It echoes Jauffret’s own experiences working in the California Attorney General’s office. Although she worked as a criminal attorney, clients sometimes mistook her for a student or intern because of how she sounds. At airport security her husband, a Navy officer, and sons, were waved through, while she was pulled aside and patted down.

The novel, released last year, reflects the current political climate where people who look or sound foreign may be viewed with suspicion. But that’s not new, just more visible, Jauffret said.

“What’s coming to light today has always existed,” she said. “Today it’s more prevalent and publicized in the media, so people are more aware of it. Justice and due process are affected by people’s perception and public opinion.”

School Cuts Hit San Diego Hard

San Diego schools are reeling after Trump froze $50 million in funding that local districts were counting on, our Jakob McWhinney reports: “The frozen grants funded everything from services for English language learners to professional development for teachers to before- and after-school care.”

You can see how much your local district is losing here.

School officials aren’t certain whether the cuts are final, but Trump’s statement claiming the money was being “grossly misused to subsidize a radical leftwing agenda” isn’t encouraging. California school superintendent Tony Thurmond plans to fight the cuts in court, saying the funds were “illegally impounded.”

The Sacramento Report runs every Friday. Do you have tips, ideas or questions? Send them to me at deborah@voiceofsandiego.org.