Cascadia today: ICE arrests surge in WA + Seattle city council hates renters + printmaking with a steamroller

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ICE arrests surge in Washington

Washington State Standard reports that arrests by ICE have grown to rates 85% higher than 2024. In addition, only 31% of those arrested in June had any criminal records, as immigration officials scrambled to meet Trump advisor Stephen Miller's targets for mass deportation. Predictably, officials quoted in the article tried to paint any undocumented immigrants as "criminals" – though the article correctly points out this is a civil violation.

Liliana Chumpitasi, deputy director at the advocacy organization La Resistencia, said in an email that this tough-on-crime approach “is used as an excuse to destroy our communities.”

In related news, Oregon's Senator Ron Wyden is calling for federal legislation to stop immigration agents from wearing masks. And a federal appeals court, ruling in a lawsuit that filed by states including Oregon and Washington, halted Trump's executive order ending birthright citizenship , calling it "blatantly unconstitutional.” In Eugene, the private charter flight company Avelo announced it will to be ending deportation flights out of Eugene Airport after a campaign of protests there, Eugene Weekly reports. Meanwhile, the Stranger notes that the Thing music festival in Carnation, Washington has canceled an August 16 event that was to highlight Latinx and Spanish-language artists – over concerns about an ICE presence at the festival.

Seattle city council hates renters

PubliCola reports that the Seattle Renters Commission is still without confirmed board members after several city council members declined to show up for a Housing committee meeting. Rob Saka and Sara Nelson were absent, offering lame excuses but ostensibly supporting of former council member Cathy Moore's idea that the commission be replaced with a panel of equal numbers of landlords and tenants. Seattle voters: your ballots should have arrived, so you know what to do. Meanwhile, the office of mayor Bruce Harrell has been silent in response to Trump's recent executive order threatening to cut funding to cities that don't sweep homeless encampments or stop proven programs such as harm reduction and safe consumption. Odd, wonder when he'll speak up?

BC miners are rescued

CBC reports that three miners trapped after a tunnel caved in were rescued. The mine is one of the projects Canadian PM Mark Carney wants to fast track with limited consultation from First Nations. The Narwhal looks at BC First Nation's response to a recent conference on federal consultation, and notes that the current federal government is fast-tracking f0rward fossil fuel projects regardless of Indigenous concerns.

Washington works to ban forever chemicals

Cascade PBS reports on how the Washington State Department of Ecology is moving forward with restrictions on PFAS and other "forever chemicals" used in firefighting foam, waterproof products, and nonstick pans – and are known to cause cancers. It's good that Cascadia is taking the lead to ban these chemicals, which I reported on last year are prevalent in many water systems across Washington state. Not surprisingly, the Trump administration Environmental Protection Agency has worked to rollback limits proposed in the Biden administration.

Printmaking with a steamroller

The Portland Mercury has a great story on an appropriately quirky Portland art project: making huge art prints using huge linocuts and a motorized steamroller normally used for paving roads.

“Steamroll printing is a completely wonderful and irreverent art [for] printmakers who want to do giant linocuts that are usually too big to fit inside a press." --Laura Master, owner of Portland printmaking shop Atelier Meridian.

Oh, and here's a link I forgot to include in yesterday's newsletter to a South Seattle Emerald story on an Indigenous youth project creating a "rematriation" pavilion in Rainier Beach.

--Andrew Engelson