Learn more about our research on immigration enforcement in the PNW before the event: jsis.washington.edu/humanrights/...

Panelists include:
- Alyssa Walker Keller, Portland Immigrant Rights Coalition
- Angelina Godoy, UW Center for Human Rights
- David Montes, @acluwa.bsky.social
- David Morales, Yakima Immigrant Response Network
- Stephen Manning, @innovationlawlab.bsky.social

Purple event poster with a photo of David Morales of Yakima Immigrant Response Network speaking at an immigrant rights and climate justice rally. Photo credit/ Donald W. Meyers, Yakima Herald. 2026 Spring Symposium, Thursday, May 14, 2026, 5:00 - 6:00 p.m. | Reception, 6:00 - 7:30 p.m. | Main program, Kane Hall, Room 225, Free and open to the public, Join us in person or live stream, Registration required: www.tinyurl.com/springevent2026 Panelists: Alyssa Walker Keller, Portland Immigrant Rights Coalition Angelina Godoy, UW Center for Human Rights David Montes, ACLU of Washington David Morales, Yakima Immigrant Response Network Stephen Manning, Innovation Law Lab

Join us for UWCHR's 2026 Spring Symposium ft. a discussion on PNW immigration trends and how local communities are responding to today’s heightened enforcement and changing tactics.

Thurs, May 14, 2026, 5-7:30 pm
Kane Hall, Room 225

Join in person or online!
RSVP: www.tinyurl.com/springevent2026

UWCHR is proud to support this project, learn more here:
jsis.washington.edu/humanrights/...

Seven Early-Career Researchers Selected for the William T. Grant Scholars Class of 2031 - William T. Grant Foundation The Foundation is delighted to announce the newest class of William T. Grant Scholars: Tolani Britton, in the school of education at the University of California, Berkeley James Chu,in the department ...

Congratulations to Dr. Rocha Beardall on joining the next class of William T. Grant Scholars!

Dr. Rocha Beardall is working under the Puyallup Tribal Historic Preservation Department's direction to recover Puyallup children’s boarding school records held by outside institutions for over a century.

Black and white photo of Professor Cabrera over a purple background. Title reads, “UW Prof. Angel Cabrera goes before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights to argue in favor of recognizing democracy as a human right.” A quote reads: “Rather than treating democracy as a fixed institutional arrangement to be preserved, [we are invited] to see it as a collective and ongoing project—one that requires constant renewal and active engagement from society.”

Is democracy a human right?

Prof. Angel Cabrera (assistant professor of Int'l Law at UW Tacoma and UWCHR faculty associate) appeared before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights to argue in favor of recognizing democracy as a human right.

Read more:
jsis.washington.edu/humanrights/...

New reporting shows first confirmed cases in Eastern Washington where Department of Licensing and Washington State Patrol shared data with federal immigration agencies for civil enforcement, despite state laws prohibiting it.

Reporting from Range Media, with data analysis support from UWCHR.

Read the full reports:

Roadside Assist: WA's Continued Sharing of Drivers’ Information with Federal Immigration Enforcement
jsis.washington.edu/humanrights/...

Leaving the Door Wide Open: Flock Surveillance Systems Expose WA Data to Immigration Enforcement
jsis.washington.edu/humanrights/...

Flock Surveillance & DOL Info Sharing - UWCHR presentation at YVC YouTube video by Yakima Immigrant Response Network

Want to know more about Flock surveillance in WA state?
Curious about ICE/CBP accessing WA DOL data?

ICYMI: UWCHR's Phil Neff presents our 2026 research updates at Yakima Valley College with the Yakima Immigrant Response Network.

Watch the presentation:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iGx...

The Life and Legacy of Efraín Arévalo Ibarra This is the story of Efraín Arévalo Ibarra: a teacher, father, and union member who was “disappeared” by the Salvadoran government in November 1977.

Incredible multi-media report from our friends at @uwchr.bsky.social telling the story of Efraín Arévalo Ibarra: a teacher, father, and union member who was “disappeared” by the Salvadoran government in November 1977. unfinishedsentences.org/reports/efra...

Learn more about the newly published regional I-213 data, obtained by UWCHR as part of an ongoing FOIA settlement:

jsis.washington.edu/humanrights/...

New data sheds light on ICE arrests in King County. Here’s what we know so far. - Auburn Reporter Of the 1,019 arrests by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) reported in King County in 2025, at least 25 arrests are listed as taking place in Federal Way, according to data from the Univer...

"Looking at the regional data can be more useful when getting a picture of likely ICE activity’s impact on the Federal Way community."

Auburn Reporter reviews data obtained by UWCHR to find immigration arrest trends in South King County: www.auburn-reporter.com/2026/03/25/n...

Read the full story: www.tinyurl.com/efrain-eng. A black and white old family portrait of Efrain, his wife, and his three daughters. Efraín holds one of his daughters in his arms. On a yellow background.

Read more about Efraín's story:
unfinishedsentences.org/reports/efra...

November 27, 1977: Archbishop Romero mentions Iris Idalia Portillo Alfaro, her son Paín, and the disappearance of her husband, Efraín. In the same homily, he announces the formation of COMADRES, a group of mothers and family members of disappeared and/or imprisoned political prisoners in El Salvador. November 26, 1978: Archbishop Romero again references the Arévalo Ibarra family, noting the disappearance of Efraín Arévalo Ibarra. “I urge all the noble forces in El Salvador to take action. What I ask is this: freedom for all those who are suffering unjustly. Either bring them before the courts to be judged, or let them go free!” March 16, 1980: Archbishop Romero quotes Iris on her son’s death and her husband’s disappearance, one week before Romero’s own assassination. “Make her sorrow your own, sisters and brothers. It is the sorrow of all of us.” Four black and white portraits on the right side of the slide show Paín, Efraín, Archbishop Romero, and Iris.

The publication features excerpts from homilies of the priest and human rights advocate Archbishop Óscar Romero mentioning the Arévalo Ibarra family, including a mention of the family’s plight just one week before the Archbishop himself was assassinated forty-six years ago today, on March 24, 1980.

Since 2012, UWCHR researchers have filed over 700 public records requests seeking the declassification of records that might shed light on events during El Salvador’s civil war. In 2022, researchers received a declassified 1979 CIA document describing the extrajudicial execution of Efraín Arévalo Ibarra and three other political prisoners. With help, researchers contacted Efraín’s family, who then learned, for the first time, details of Efraín’s death. Efraín’s family came together with UWCHR to share their experiences and their search for justice across the generations. This is their story. UWCHR’s Unfinished Sentences project aims to document and share stories of survivors of crimes against humanity committed in the context of El Salvador’s armed conflict, and to support Salvadoran efforts for truth and accountability. A black line falling vertically on the left side creates a timeline with the above text. On the right are four grayscale portrait illustrations of Efraín and his three daughters.

Told in collaboration with the Arévalo Ibarra family, the new publication weaves together declassified U.S. government documents obtained as part of UWCHR’s Unfinished Sentences project, stories from Mr. Arévalo Ibarra’s surviving family members, family photographs, and illustrations.

He Couldn’t Close His Eyes to Injustice: The Life and Legacy of Efraín Arévalo Ibarra. This is the story of Efraín Arévalo Ibarra: a teacher, father, and union member who was “disappeared” by the Salvadoran government in November 1977. Told in collaboration between the University of Washington Center for Human Rights and the Arévalo Ibarra family. Gray-scale illustration of Efraín, wearing thick rimmed glasses, a yellow circle stylistically in the background behind him highlighting his face. Scanned documents related to his life make up the background.

Today, on #InternationalRightToTruthDay, we are honored to share a new multimedia publication celebrating the life and legacy of Salvadoran union organizer and educator Efraín Arévalo Ibarra, who was disappeared by the government of El Salvador in 1977.

unfinishedsentences.org/reports/efra...

Trump Has Detained the Parents of More Than 11,000 U.S. Citizen Kids A ProPublica analysis of new ICE data shows that Trump has detained parents of U.S. citizen children at about twice the rate that Biden did, and moms have been deported four times as often.

NEW: For the first time, ProPublica has been able to quantify how many U.S. citizen children have been directly affected by Trump’s immigration crackdown: more than 11,000 kids had a parent detained — and that’s an undercount. 1/ 🧵
www.propublica.org/article/trum...

Data used in ProPublica's analysis was obtained by UWCHR as part of an ongoing public records lawsuit.

bsky.app/profile/uwch...

A newly released dataset, obtained by UWCHR and analyzed by @propublica.org, shows new trends in immigration detention and deportation from 2023-2025, including higher rates of family separation.

"That’s an average of more than 50 U.S. citizen kids a day with a parent pulled into detention."

ICE used arrest quotas and surveillance technology in Oregon immigration raids, rare court testimony shows Federal data and reports show a sharp increase in arrests in the state in 2025, while lawyers denounce tactics that could violate civil rights

“We were frankly blown away by the scale of the arrests in the Portland area from October to December of last year.” - Phil Neff, UWCHR research coordinator

@elpais.com coverage of immigration arrests in Oregon cites UWCHR research:

english.elpais.com/usa/2026-03-...

Learn more about WA DOL - ICE/CBP data sharing:
bsky.app/profile/uwch...

See our full update on 2022-2025 immigration arrest trends in the PNW: jsis.washington.edu/humanrights/...

King County saw the most street immigration arrests across WA in 2025 Immigration arrests in King County increased more than 300% from January to December last year. That’s according to federal records obtained by researchers at the University of Washington’s Center for...

Immigration arrests in King County increased more than 300% from January to December last year, according to federal records obtained by the UW Center for Human Rights.

CBP/ICE access to Washington Department of Licensing data is aiding in those arrests.

www.kuow.org/stories/king...

“Before they left, they had some officer sign a bunch of blank arrest warrants. It’s like a bunch of blank checks. Then when they go out into the field, they shatter someone’s window, arrest them and fill in the arrest warrant.”

OPB connects OR residents' stories to new UWCHR data analysis.

bsky.app/profile/uwch...

New UW data shows immigration arrests surged in the Pacific Northwest in late 2025 Researchers say arrests more than doubled in a matter of months, with Yakima County recording the highest rate in Washington.

“It appears that a lot of these arrests, particularly vehicular arrests on the side of highways, involve dragnet surveillance of communities. Agents scanning people’s license plates, accessing DOL data, and using that to identify people.” - Phil Neff, UWCHR

www.king5.com/article/news...

“In the Pacific Northwest migrant communities have been reporting — and this data confirms — a dramatic uptick in enforcement, and with it, mounting concerns about serious rights abuses happening on our streets and in our workplaces.” - Angelina Godoy, UWCHR director

Where in the Pacific Northwest ICE has arrested people The Portland area and agricultural communities in Washington were hit particularly hard, new University of Washington Center for Human Rights data show.

“The surge we’re seeing in other parts of the country is happening in the Pacific Northwest,” said Phil Neff, research coordinator at the center. “In Yakima, it’s been a major issue, and the surge in Portland is truly unprecedented for the region.”

www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news...

Read the full update for more information: tinyurl.com/2025PNWtrends

Explore the data:
tinyurl.com/2025PNWtrend...

This new dataset was released to UWCHR as part of an ongoing FOIA lawsuit against DHS.

bsky.app/profile/uwch...