Video Shows ICE Detaining Autistic Girl in Massachusetts

A Leominster, Massachusetts family says ICE agents held their 5-year-old autistic daughter outside their home to pressure her father, Edward Hip, to surrender, and video obtained by Telemundo and aired by local NBC affiliates shows the child surrounded by agents as relatives pleaded for her return. According to the family and local outlets, agents demanded Hip show identification at the door and threatened to enter if it was not opened; Leominster police later recovered and returned the child to the family. Two days later — the family says on the mother’s birthday — federal agents returned, pulled Hip from his car and arrested him; he is being held at an ICE detention site in Plymouth. The family says they have an active asylum claim, two U.S.-born children, and that the girl is in good but shaken condition. ICE/DHS has not issued a detailed public comment, and the widely circulated footage has prompted calls for an investigation and renewed criticism of aggressive immigration enforcement tactics.