Testimony of Ruben Quesada
Chief of Police
Town of Swampscott (Massachusetts) Police Department
Hearing on
“ICE Under Fire: The Radical Left’s Crusade Against Immigration Enforcement”
Before the
Committee on the Judiciary
Subcommittee on Border Security and Immigration
U.S. Senate
Washington, D.C.
Chairman Cornyn, Ranking Member Padilla, and other distinguished members of the Subcommittee on Border Security and Immigration, thank you for the opportunity to provide written testimony today.
My name is Dr. Ruben Quesada, and I am the Chief of Police for the town of Swampscott, Massachusetts. I am a fourth-generation Mexican American, born and raised in Phoenix, Arizona. I joined the Mesa, Arizona Police Department in 1995 where I spent 25 years of my policing career with oversight of several high-profile areas in the nation’s 37th largest city and third most populous city in the state of Arizona. My experience spans both administrative and operational roles. In my last area of assignment in Mesa, I held the position of administrative Police Commander within the Office of the Chief of Police. After spending most of my policing career in Arizona, I embarked on my transition to the East Coast through my current role as the Chief of Police in Swampscott, Massachusetts, where I have served since March 2022.
I am also a national co-chair for the Law Enforcement Immigration Task Force (LEITF) a national consortium of Police Chiefs and Sheriffs throughout the country seeking bipartisan and sensible solutions to immigration reform.[1] I am a Human and Civil Rights Committee member with the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) and strong proponent of community policing and building trust within the community. Aside from my distinguished policing career, I have conducted extensive and rigorous research as part of my doctoral dissertation examining Latino police officers, community policing, the Spanish language, and how policing intersects with immigration issues. Additionally, I am a byproduct of positive police-community relations, as a former at-risk youth arrested and mandated to carry out community service at a local police activities league program in Phoenix, Arizona when I was 16 years old.
This hearing is examining the reaction to immigration enforcement activities carried out by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agencies in local communities throughout the nation. While individuals should not interfere, impede, or hinder federal agents, various enforcement tactics may actually undermine community trust. As a former street crimes and undercover officer and supervisor, I am concerned about some tactics utilized by teams charged with immigration enforcement and apprehensions, particularly surprise “jump out” or “stop and block” tactics. While I do not question the caliber, character, nor commitment of my federal partners, I am worried about the composition of these teams who originate from various areas of DHS – including ERO, CBP, HSI – with limited tactical street experience. Some of these tactics place our federal partners at risk and can be viewed by the public as “clumsy.” When coupled with no uniform standards or legal mandates to properly identify themselves as federal personnel, other than wearing non-descript ballistic (green, tan, and even black) vests that say “POLICE,” it can create a high level of stress and uncertainty in the community as to whether the federal agents are in fact law enforcement.
As a policing professional, I am deeply concerned with individuals who obstruct, interfere, impede, or hinder my fellow federal partners from conducting the lawful performance of their duties. Additionally, I am concerned that our federal partners have failed to communicate with local and state policing professionals during highly visible and contentious immigration enforcement operations conducted in our communities. This lack of coordination and communication with local law enforcement is akin to the “…deep institutional failings within our government” as outlined in the 9/11 Commission Report (Chapter 8 pg. 265). This lack of planning and communication – combined with the public’s reaction – places a strain on an already heavily burdened and short-staffed police response.
In my experience, small town policing is often staffed for day-to-day activities and not for prolonged civil disorders or unrest. Interference with ICE not only places my officers, our community, and our partner federal agents at risk; it places an entire community in danger. Failures in communication with local law enforcement coupled with a lack of operational safety and planning create an opportunity for civil unrest, disorder, and, consequently, illegal detention. The lack of communication adds to further inquiries by local elected officials and the public whether police are involved in some type of law enforcement operation that could place the community at risk. Without some form of communication from federal agencies, local police departments are unable to provide any type of response or release of information thus adding to the strain of call volume workload and, even worse, negative community speculation. This exerts a cost to government trust that can never be reclaimed.
Recent changes to DHS enforcement policies, with a focus on interior immigration arrests, have taken a toll on community trust in general. This makes it harder for local law enforcement to encourage immigrant victims and witnesses to cooperate with investigations. The justification by DHS and federal law enforcement for the new enforcement posture is that they are taking real criminals off the street. But the data indicates that only a fraction of those targeted have criminal convictions or arrests. I’m concerned about the impact of DHS messaging. I worry that such framing is misleading and turns the focus away from core threats to public safety.
I respect my fellow federal policing professionals, though our missions are not the same. In my experience, the best way to describe local policing and immigration enforcement is most synonymous with the apples and oranges analogy. The federal administration’s current practices are antithetical to the mission and ethos that has been instilled since my first day on the job as an officer in the 1990s. These issues confound public perception into the misconception that federal law enforcement is rounding up “hardened criminals.” Many violations of immigration law, such as unlawful presence or overstaying a visas, are not criminal offenses, but civil offenses. And while some immigration offenses, such as illegal entry and illegal reentry after removal, are criminal offenses, individuals convicted of these offenses infrequently pose a threat to public safety.[2]
Efforts to vilify foreignness or the conflation of immigration status and crime can make it harder to take real criminals off the street. My job as a Chief of Police is to ensure that public policy, human decency, and the law meet in harmony. I believe that those individuals who prey on the innocent and commit violent crimes should and must be held accountable. This intersection of mindful and constitutional policing is usually found at the corner of consequence and humanity.
The depiction of lady justice’s blindfold means any person from any background race, ethnicity, or other factors can and should be held accountable for their actions in a court of law. Correspondingly, I have witnessed that any person from any of the same characteristics can also be a victim of a crime. My ethos as a Police Chief is to be blind to both. My endeavor is to protect my community regardless of the perpetrator’s race while ignoring the victim’s ethnicity, even if it is different from my own. Municipal and state police are now expected to take that blindfold off; arrest and assist with the federal mandate of immigration enforcement. I am fearful of where this may lead.
I am an equal-opportunity policing professional. I am not afraid to hold anyone accountable who violates the law, but I also have never been instructed to treat groups of individuals like “criminals” simply because they have committed a civil immigration offense.
I have worked undercover narcotics, street gang enforcement, and plain clothed street crime enforcement. My experience tells me that those who I have arrested or seen arrested were not prone to crime solely based on their race, nationality, or immigration status alone. As a street cop, I simply could not predict an individual’s susceptibility to committing a crime based solely on their immigration status. “Criminal” should not be synonymous with immigration status. Immigrants are a large part of what has made this nation great.
While my contention is that my duties representing local law enforcement may be very different from those at the federal level, we must find a consensus in protocols that keep everyone safe. This can only be accomplished by sound and reasonable national law enforcement practices and protocols in immigration enforcement. Current interior immigration enforcement tactics and the interference of ICE in localities often only serve to create further confusion and negative emotions within our communities. As a Chief of Police, I have sworn to uphold the tenets of the U.S. Constitution and laws within my state. I am charged with prevention, protection, and public safety within my community. I promise to uphold these values and will continue to unite the community and country that I love.
[1] “Press Release,” Law Enforcement Immigration Task Force, February 25, 2025.
[2] “Fact Sheet: Immigrants and Crime” Law Enforcement Immigration Task Force, June 26, 2018.