By Abigail Greenblatt and Cambel Shim
On Wednesday, March 18th, the Massachusetts Legislature heard public testimony on the PROTECT Act. Filed by the Black and Latino Legislative Caucus, the PROTECT Act (HD.5608) seeks to codify protections from federal immigration enforcement in Massachusetts into law. In the wake of abuses by the Trump Administration and Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Minneapolis, Governor Healey has demonstrated her commitment to protecting Massachusetts residents through executive orders and administrative guidance. It’s now time for the Legislature to step up.
Every day, we see how the protections we once considered common sense are being manipulated or eroded by the Trump administration. The reversal of the protected areas policy and the targeting of sensitive locations such as schools, churches, and courthouses have made it clear to residents across the country what it looks like when executive orders are reversed overnight. The PROTECT Act would restore longstanding protections limiting ICE enforcement in these spaces where vulnerable people should feel safe to access basic support and services without fear. Across the country, people have built their lives around protections that were always one election away from disappearing. That is exactly why executive action is not enough, and why the Legislature must act. These protections must be codified into law to withstand the test of time and unpredictability of election cycles.
These threats extend beyond the executive branch to the judicial branch, where the Supreme Court’s 6-3 conservative majority has been breaking precedent by overturning prior rulings and chipping away at freedoms many had considered settled, as we saw when Dobbs overturned decades of precedent overnight. When both federal branches are in upheaval, states cannot afford to wait. Massachusetts has an opportunity, and an obligation, to use its legislative branch as a stabilizing force, demonstrating that checks and balances still work when political leaders commit to them.
As a Northeastern student, I am enriched by its international community. My classmates, my friends, my roommates; many of them from all over the world. We all chose Boston for the same reason immigrants always have: because this city has something to offer, and they have something to offer it back. That is not a threat.
What is a threat is a world where people are afraid to go to school, to seek medical care, to walk into a courthouse to pursue the very legal process we tell them to follow. People who are afraid don’t show up. And when they don’t show up—to court, to the doctor, to report a crime—we all lose something.
People across the nation are no longer comfortable standing idly by while our fellow man is beaten, kidnapped, and murdered in the streets. Bills like the PROTECT Act allow the government to do what it was created to do: maintain order, protect its constituents, and allow our country to prosper. It is not outlandish to ask our lawmakers to do their jobs and to work on these issues. We are all vulnerable to the tyranny of this institution.
Stop the tip-offs from government officials to ICE; end the collaboration between state and federal law enforcement. Massachusetts needs to stand unified against ICE and protect what has always been the backbone of our society: immigrants.
When the federal government abandons its role as a supporter of constitutional rights, the states become the last line of defense. But for that defense to be real, it must be written into law, not subject to the winds of electoral change or executive discretion. The people have spoken. Now it’s time for the Legislature to act.
Abigail Greenblatt and Cambel Shim are Northeastern University undergraduates who are interns with MAPA
