SEATTLE — Boeing Field, officially known as King County International Airport (KCIA), has been court-ordered to allow the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to resume deportation flights following a years-long court battle over an executive order issued in 2019.
In April 2019, King County Executive Dow Constantine issued an executive order that placed a ban on all deportation flights of immigration detainees out of KCIA, a publicly owned airport, to combat “troubling immigration practices” that “could lead to human rights abuses and violations”
ICE said in a statement that its air operations transport detained noncitizens to various ICE-managed facilities across the country or to the detainees’ country of origin in a “safe and humane” way.
In court documents, the county said it believed it needed to take action to put a stop to the deportation flights after it learned of ICE’s usage of the airport and a report from the University of Washington Center for Human Rights.
The county also stated that it felt that “if ICE flights continued and the advocacy groups changed from being advocates to being activists that [they] were very likely to see protests” and that businesses that operated out of the airport “could very well decide that this was not the airport they wanted to operate at and take their business elsewhere.”
The documents stated ICE explored using other airports in the region including Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, Portland International Airport, the airfield at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, and an airport in Bellingham, but that none of the airports would take ICE charter flights. Eventually, the flights resumed from a Yakima airport.
The U.S. Department of Justice filed a federal lawsuit in February 2020 to overturn King County’s executive order.
United States District Judge Robert J. Bryan ruled in March that the entire executive order should be declared invalid. He ruled the county’s executive order “discriminates against the federal government because other users of the airport are not subject to the limitations found” in the order.
ICE confirmed at least one deportation flight took place at KCIA last week. The flight last week ultimately landed in Guatemala after making stops in Arizona, Texas and Louisiana.
ICE said does not confirm or discuss future and pending flights due to security reasons.
King County said starting May 15 and the 15th of each month KCIA will release information on ICE flights from the previous month on the county’s website.
“King County remains dedicated to safeguarding the public’s right to total transparency regarding any federal actions at our airport that violate our values. We will continue our longstanding commitment to creating a welcoming community that respects the rights of all people,” Constantine said in a statement Friday.