How interesting that Deval Patrick actually had ample warning about the raid of the New Bedford leather factory by federal agents.
Federal immigration agents first briefed senior members of the incoming Patrick administration about plans to raid a Massachusetts sweatshop that employed undocumented workers last December, days before Governor Deval Patrick even took office.Of course, now he's blaming federal officials for not coordinating their efforts with the state.In the following two months, there were face-to-face meetings and conference calls between state officials and the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency to discuss the potential human as well as legal consequences of the planned roundup of laborers working illegally at the Michael Bianco Inc. leather factory in New Bedford.
Governor Deval Patrick, responding to criticism that he had ample warning of an immigration raid in New Bedford and didn't do enough to protect workers' children, said yesterday that federal officials had reneged on promises that the raid would be made in coordination with the state.Interestingly enough, his explanation does not square with those of the state's public safety secretary or the commissioner of DSS:Patrick himself was told in February that the raid would target the defense contractor that was using a largely undocumented female workforce to make safety vests for US soldiers in Iraq. Commissioner Harry Spence of the Massachusetts Department of Social Services was told a raid was coming several days before it occurred. The night before the sweep, Bruce Foucart, the ICE agent in charge of the operation, spoke with Spence to coordinate law enforcement and child protection aspects of the raid.
"Our expectation, for example, was that we would have access at the site to individuals who were being detained," the governor said at a press conference yesterday. "We then expected we would have access at [Fort] Devens. We didn't get that access from the folks who were making the calls on the ground. Those were all understandings we had going in."So, at the end of the day, Deval Patrick is an incompetent liar.However, Patrick's account is at odds with those of Kevin Burke, the state's public safety secretary, and Harry Spence, the commissioner of the Department of Social Services. In an interview with the Globe, Burke said that in the weeks preceding the raid, his attempts to ensure that DSS workers would have access to workers immediately after the arrests were repeatedly rebuffed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials.
"My concern was for the effect this would have on families and what responsibility people were taking for dealing with families," said Burke, whose office was in regular contact with ICE over the course of more than two months leading up to the raid.