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With immigration reform stalled in Congress, young activists are stepping up protests to dramatize the toll of deportation on families. But critics question whether the actual numbers fit the claims.

The nine-to-five crowd had thinned out by the time a mostly Latino crowd arrived outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) processing center here to mark the end of a 15-day hunger strike this week.

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Weakened by the lack of food, strike participants sat in wheelchairs, surrounded by friends and family, under a sidewalk canopy. They had fasted to call attention to the Obama administration's deportations and the detention of spouses, children, and siblings, many of whom remain behind bars for being in the country illegally. On Monday, the hungry group savored a bowl of vegetable soup and promised continued protests.

"This doesn't stop here, we will keep at it," says Anselma Lpez, a Guatemala native who was briefly hospitalized for health complications after several days of not eating.

With hope fading over Congress's capacity to tackle immigration reform anytime soon a bipartisan reform bill passed the Senate last June but has stalled in the GOP-controlled House pro-immigrant tactics to pressure the Obama administration to act are escalating.

Protesters want the president to use his executive powers to end deportations, until Congress can overhaul immigration laws and establish a path to legal status for some 11 million people now in the country illegally.

Critics call the fasts and vigils "protest theater" that aims to stir up emotion but doesn't fit how federal agents are enforcing the nation's immigration laws on the ground.

"The kind of enforcement that the activist groups are upset about is interior enforcement, where people living here get caught and get removed," says Jessica Vaughan, director of policy studies for the Center for Immigration Studies in Washington, which promotes tighter immigration enforcement. "But that kind of enforcement has dropped 40 percent in the last two years."

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Why pro-immigrant activists are turning to hunger strikes (+video)