Amid Mass. ICE Crackdown, Cambridge City Council Announces More Immigrant Resources

Updated September 17, 2025, at 2:32 a.m.

The Cambridge City Council directed City Manager Yi-An Huang ’05 on Monday night to design and implement resources to address emergency immigration incidents in Cambridge, as Immigration and Customs Enforcement cracks down on the Boston metro area.

The policy order, which was approved unanimously, calls for the creation of a “24-hour immigration emergency hotline” to direct city staff in relevant situations, a larger interpreter network, a legal directory, and specific protocols for handling ICE-related incidents.

Cambridge’s existing multilingual helpline is available on weekdays during business hours. The city also maintains a 24/7 phone interpretation service designed for use by city staff assisting residents, according to spokesperson Jeremy H. Warnick.

Mayor E. Denise Simmons said she proposed the policy order after an incident on Wednesday night, in which she was contacted by a Cambridge family seeking help with a situation involving ICE officers.

According to Simmons, the urgent call came in the evening after many city offices and non-profit aid groups had closed for the day.

“The parents were already wearing ankle bracelets, and their passports had already been confiscated by ICE, and detention seemed imminent,” Simmons said.

The incident unfolded as Simmons was scheduled to appear at a candidate forum hosted just steps away from city hall. She briefly appeared to announce the reason for her absence and to urge attendees to be patient as the city worked to develop an adequate response.

“As we all know, we’re living in some very dark times right now, and unfortunately, those dark times are getting closer and closer to our front door,” she said during her brief appearance.

Simmons believes the provisions would have been useful as she sought ways to help the family navigate an immigration enforcement crisis.

“A lot of the city departments that we would have automatically called were closed. Legal resources and community partners were closed,” Simmons said.

“We didn’t have a protocol or hotline or interpreter on standby, and no system to escalate, just a terrified family and a staff doing its best,” she added.

The Council approved the policy order as the Boston area experiences an increase in federal immigration officer presence after the Trump administration began an immigration crackdown across Massachusetts called “Operation Patriot 2.0.”

At last week’s Council meeting, Police Commissioner Christine A. Elow informed the council that ICE had contacted the police department asking for information on undocumented immigrants at least six times so far this year. According to Elow, CPD consistently declined to cooperate with ICE given the city’s sanctuary status.

Huang said he agreed with the order and believes that the City could make its immigration resources more accessible, promising to have an update on the progress by early October.

“I think we can improve the way that we’re coordinating with residents’ families in Cambridge that are showing up in our community and are looking for information,” Huang said. “They are struggling with a really tragic situation, and I do think there is real opportunity for us to put more of this on paper.”

Councilors said that the city should focus on curating and providing resources to residents as soon as possible.

“The message is, do this, make sure we can provide people with the support and services, and make sure that we’re not duplicating efforts or recreating and reinventing the wheel, because we don’t have the time to do that,” Councilor Patricia M. “Patty” Nolan ’80 said.

“This is happening right now,” she added.

— Staff writer Shawn A. Boehmer can be reached at shawn.boehmer@thecrimson.com. Follow him on X @ShawnBoehmer.

— Staff writer Jack B. Reardon can be reached at jack.reardon@thecrimson.com. Follow him on X @JackBReardon.