ICE activity is surging ahead of midterms. So is voter turnout.

Very early on Wednesday morning, Dover, N.J., Councilwoman Sandra Wittner started getting messages about immigration agents. A dozen or more were gathering outside a Walgreens, according to the messages she was getting. Throughout the day, neighbors in north New Jersey saw a spike in Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity.

And New Jersey is not alone. In the weeks ahead of the midterms, various cities and states across the country are reporting a notable rise in ICE activity, according to reports gathered by NPR and its member stations.

"The tactics that the administration has been deploying in communities really appear to be designed to try to intimidate voters," says Wendy Weiser of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law School. Despite that, early turnout is surging.

"There was definitely a lot of apprehension and fear," Wittner recalls. "We just really weren't sure if something huge was about to happen. People were not feeling very comfortable or safe."

Wittner is not sure who was detained or where, which is unsurprising: these days it's difficult to report on ICE crackdowns as they happen, because the Department of Homeland Security no longer publicly shares timely information on its operations.

NPR wrote to the agency to ask if there has been a recent surge. It responded: "ICE agents uphold our nation's immigration laws in all 50 states, seven days a week, 24 hours a day."

And yet NPR and its member stations have received tips from rural Illinois, Oregon, Detroit and California about surges in ICE enforcement throughout October.

An official within New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani's office who was not authorized to speak publicly confirmed that they have noted a surge in ICE activity in the city.

"We're certainly witnessing an uptick in activity, and have been since the summer," says a member of a volunteer group of neighbors in New York. She asked that NPR not use her name, as she is worried about retaliation. Her group goes to the scene where an ICE operation is happening, documents it, reminds those being detained of their rights, and alerts neighbors.

"In the past few weeks we've seen numerous large operations, or what we call cluster raids, multiple agents going to one spot and then the next," she said.

On the other side of the country, Oregon Public Broadcasting reporter Troy Brynelson has reported on a similar trend. "What we were seeing in early October and what we've seen continue, at least anecdotally throughout this month, is that ICE activity has really picked up in Portland." Brynelson says it seems to be concentrated in commercial areas. "I'd say it's a noticeable uptick compared to what we've seen over the summer."

Juan Proaño of the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), a civil rights organization, says he's concerned because this is happening so close to the midterm elections. "It's not about ICE at the actual polling station, it's ICE at the perimeter of the polling station," he says.

"Mass enforcement actions could be away from the polls, but with social media and the news, it could be enough to dissuade somebody from actually going out to vote."

Weiser of the Brennan Center says there's no indication the raids are affecting turnout. On the contrary, she says there has been a surge in early voting in minority communities across the country. "The good news is: it isn't working. Americans are tuning this out and we are not seeing a significant impact on participation. And we are actually seeing huge surges in participation in communities of color, and in Latino communities, and in all the communities that have been targeted by ICE and DHS."

Even so, she says that intimidation at the polls is illegal, and should be reported.
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