On February 3rd, ICE agents detained popular rapper 21 Savage in his “native” area, Atlanta. They later spoke about the situation and reported that the rapper, whose legal name is, Shayaa Bin Abraham-Joseph, came over to the US in 2005, from the United Kingdom and has overstayed his visa. He also has been arrested numerous times for drugs and gun charges.
Many fans were baffled, due to the rapper never acknowledging his apparent British background, but many are skeptical, due to this not being the first time ICE has detained an American citizen for no reason at all.
The surprise detainment happened just mere hours before the superbowl, and almost took away the attention from the highly anticipated game. However it arose many questions such as, “why now?” and “is he truly not an american citizen?”
As the news has been following the haunting details of the detainments, such as the thousands of immigrant children they have collected over the past several months, this is just icing on the cake, but also instills fear into regular people, particularly people who have actually experienced this.
“My mom got deported this summer…it was pretty scary.” says Cheyenne Yala, a former Saint Augustine’s University student. Her mother, a Congolese immigrant recently was deported, and is banned from returning to the United States for 10 years, due to an expired visa. “I am scared that any moment ICE could come to my door, and I’d have to go to the Congo as well, simply because my parents were both immigrants.” The fear has even spread to American citizens whose families are naturalized citizens.
“I had no idea that 21 savage was not an american citizen, and I still am skeptical of it.” says India Frederick, junior theatre major. “I feel like at this point anyone will say anything to get you locked up.” ICE at this point strikes fear in not only immigrants eyes, but for naturalized citizens as well.
As the fate of 21 savage remains to be questioned, we can only hope that all can be sorted so that he may be reunited with his family and children.
