{"id":24738,"date":"2026-02-04T14:12:46","date_gmt":"2026-02-04T22:12:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/?p=24738"},"modified":"2026-03-31T14:17:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T22:17:16","slug":"ice-in-monmouth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/ice-in-monmouth\/","title":{"rendered":"ICE in Monmouth"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
A photo of ICE protesters outside of the Portland facility Feb. 1, 2026. | Photo from @theoregonian on Instagram<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Feb. 4, 2026 | <\/span>Hannah Field | Editor-in-Chief<\/span><\/p>\n

On Jan. 29, 2026, the city of Monmouth held its quarterly town hall in the evening to discuss \u201cfreedoms of speech, assembly, and expression.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe really want to talk about Monmouth and issues of the First Amendment, of freedom of speech, of freedom of assembly and how we look at those things when we have concerns,\u201d said the mayor of Monmouth, Cecelia Koontz, during the town hall. \u201cBecause we have had concerns. We have had complaints, and we have had incidents.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Present faces were city attorney Justin Thorp, Chief of Police Isaiah Haines, Polk County District Attorney Aaron Felton and Oregon Rep. Paul Evans, who is also a full-time professor of speech communication at Chemeketa Community College.<\/span><\/p>\n

Such town halls discuss budget issues, city service and various other relevant topics. Thursday\u2019s meeting discussed civic action, but divulged that Immigration and Customs Enforcement has kidnapped four people out of Monmouth \u2014 two being American citizens.<\/span><\/p>\n

Evans opened the town hall, saying, \u201cWe live in an era where people suggest violence right out of the gate. Violence stops the conversation. It doesn\u2019t enhance it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOregon is a sanctuary state,\u201d said Isaiah Haines, answering an attendee\u2019s question. \u201cThere are prohibitions that local law enforcement have from assisting immigration enforcement \u2026 I am forbidden, by law, to assist with immigration enforcement.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Haines made it clear that if called upon for help, such as in the case of a physical threat, Monmouth police will respond regardless of who needs the assistance.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIf somebody is in trouble \u2014 meaning their life is being threatened or there is a reasonable threat to be perceived \u2014 there is no prohibition on our police officers responding to support that. The difference is, as in the case that happened not long ago when four people from this community were taken away, two of which were citizens, they are not going to assist in the capture of those individuals or the detainment because that\u2019s a federal responsibility,\u201d said Evans. \u201cICE has their operations. They do what they do. If they are in danger, if they feel that they are in some form of danger, our folks will respond.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Information on the four people taken by ICE has not been publicized, nor were Western students made aware of it until mentioned at the town hall.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIf somebody really shouldn\u2019t be here, and there\u2019s a warrant to prove they shouldn\u2019t be here, (police) can help. That\u2019s not what sanctuary status is about,\u201d added Evans.<\/span><\/p>\n

Additionally, a Western student alleged that on Dec. 3, 2025, when protester and livestreamer Thomas Allen disrupted campus operations with inflammatory political statements, that people were \u201cpushed, that were pushed down the stairs, there were injuries,\u201d and that, to their knowledge, Monmouth police did not respond to calls.<\/span><\/p>\n

In response, Haines stated that officers were in communication with Western as well as Campus Public Safety and viewing the live stream to determine lawful activity during the interruption. He affirmed that all calls were answered, but no uniformed officers were required to manage the situation.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe only time I was aware ever of any contact that was made were when sidewalks were blocked, actually by from what I perceived to be students \u2026 and that actually was probably, or could be, an illegal activity. Now, we couldn\u2019t see everything just based on the view of the camera, but somebody has the right to pass through a sidewalk area in a public space, even if they\u2019re saying things that are hurtful or hateful to somebody else.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

He added, \u201cTo our knowledge, I never heard about actual injuries that happened, that were reported to us, and we didn\u2019t observe anything that we thought was criminal conduct that would warrant our response at the time.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cStand up for what you believe, so you can push ideas into concepts, into proposals, into laws, and then into implementation,\u201d Evans said.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Contact the author at howleditorinchief@wou.edu<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Feb. 4, 2026 | Hannah Field | Editor-in-Chief On Jan. 29, 2026, the city of Monmouth held its quarterly town hall in the evening to discuss \u201cfreedoms of speech, assembly, and expression.\u201d \u201cWe really want to talk about Monmouth and issues of the First Amendment, of freedom of speech, of freedom of assembly and how […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1645,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"ICE in Monmouth","_seopress_titles_desc":"Monmouth City Hall reports four taken from Monmouth by immigration enforcement and police respond to Dec. 3 livestreaming protester on campus","_seopress_robots_index":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[6047,9073,1237,9071,2476,9069,3987,7089,9075,3443,5325,7093,310,5990,9072,7577,309,4888,3195,9074],"class_list":["post-24738","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-6047","tag-aaron","tag-budget","tag-cecelia","tag-city","tag-cop","tag-cops","tag-enforcement","tag-evans","tag-hall","tag-ice","tag-immigration","tag-independence","tag-issues","tag-koontz","tag-law","tag-monmouth","tag-paul","tag-police","tag-sharp"],"modified_by":"saragerrick","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24738","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1645"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24738"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24738\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24742,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24738\/revisions\/24742"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24738"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24738"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24738"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}