ICE said it would target dangerous immigrants, but it's actually deporting a higher percentage of non-criminals
A man in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, stands next to the border fence as two U.S. law enforcement officers look on from the U.S. side of the fence.(Credit: AP/Raymundo Ruiz)
A man in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, stands next to the border fence as two U.S. law enforcement officers look on from the U.S. side of the fence.(Credit: AP/Raymundo Ruiz)
THURSDAY, MAY 17, 2012 05:15 PM EDT
The Obama administration claims that it is deporting record numbers of illegal immigrants while focusing on those with criminal records. But new data from Immigration and Customs Enforcement shows that the number of deportation orders has declined dramatically since last summer and non-criminals comprise a growing percentage of those expelled from the country.
That wasn’t supposed to happen under a policy of “prosecutorial discretion” announced by ICE director John Morton last June. The goal of the policy, announced with much fanfare in the Spanish language media, was to spare “longtime lawful residents” from deportation and to focus on criminals.
Since then, the adminstration has deported many fewer non-criminal aliens. But non-criminals remain the vast majority of those deported. And those with no criminal record now actually comprise a slightly larger percentage of those forced to leave the country than they did before Morton’s announcement.
In the three months before the policy was announced last summer ICE filed for deportation proceedings against 61,192 people of whom 15 percent had criminal records. In the first three months of 2012, ICE sought 37,659 deportations orders, 14 percent of which involved people with criminal records.
“The agency continues to be headed in the opposite direction of its stated goals,” said Susan Long, co-director of the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University, which collected the data from ICE via a Freedom of Information Act request.
The goal of prosecutorial discretion, Long said in a conference call with reporters, “was to target and bring before the court those with more serious criminal history. As yet we’re not seeing any change. They have not turned the ship around.”
The administration implemented prosecutorial discretion in response to complaints that young people with no criminal records continue to face deportation. But the new data will come as no surprise to student groups such as United We Dream, National Immigrant Youth Alliance and DreamActivist, which continue to highlight the cases of law-abiding young people facing deportation.
Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., has championed the case of a South Carolina man, Gabino Sánchez, a married father of two, who was arrested for driving without a license last year and now faces deportation.
“Gabino Sánchez has lived and worked and raised a family here for more than a decade and it is not in anyone’s interest to have him deported,” Rep. Gutierrez told Fox News Latino on Tuesday after a deportation hearing in North Carolina. ”I do not understand why ICE has not followed President Obama’s guidelines and decided to move on from this case to go after someone else, someone who is a threat to his community or a serious criminal.”
In response to the TRAC findings, Gutierrez said, “The president should make sure the Department of Homeland Security is actually following its own rules and he should proclaim proudly and loudly that he will not deport another DREAMer or anyone else who fits the prosecutorial discretion criteria.”
Regan D.- FRIDAY, MAY 18, 2012 11:06 AM EDT
We've come to a point in our country where disincentive, procedures and standards of illegal immigration are irrelevant. It's as if our borders, culture and expectations of immigrants is something to apologize for. It's NOT a civil right to cheat, fraud and ignore this country's NECESSARY means to identify and account for what KIND of immigrant is here and how many. We are, a country of limited resources, jobs and infrastructure.
Citizens and legal immigrants are demoralized when confronted with illegal immigrants demanding their cheating be forgiven and forgotten and the reward for entry be the same.
It is so wrong, immoral and without merit the way our government allows millions of people to be here without accountability, and when they break MORE laws, illegal immigrants demand MORE accommodation for it!
Such as in the case of our sanctuary city laws, and now the car impound laws are all being modified to the point of non enforcement.
Resentment of illegal immigrants is VALID, because illegal immigrants are already being offensive with this behavior.
All manner of document, identity and social services fraud in part is bankrupting many sectors of this country.
Illegal immigrants have been found in sensitive areas of gov't offices and other jobs.
WTF?!
9/11 and other tragedies could have been averted or solved, were illegal immigrants held accountable for their actions, deported and KEPT out of this country.
It's been TREASONOUS how Presidents since Carter and MORE since Reagan's amnesty, have allowed illegal immigrants to not only flood saturated job markets and the social safety net meant for citizens, but illegal immigrants demand college educations be paid for by a public already cash and tax strapped.
AMERICAN and LEGAL immigrant children have DREAMS of college too.
Illegal immigrants are literally wiping their feet on our faces and demanding we accord them what is RIGHTFULLY that of legal immigrants.
I don't care if the parents acted illegally to have their children take advantage of our nation's schools and hospitals.
If I'd cheated to get my child into a prestigious place most people want and must compete for and I gamed the system instead, the PARENTS can't be allowed to know they can do that, and STILL be treated the same as someone legally here.
And there are so many bullshit canards about deportation and family separation.
The children of foreign students, tourists and visitors, and uninvited guests are NOT citizens. They NEVER applied to be here permanently so therefore don't have that status and shouldn't demand the privileges of it.
Further, immigrants leave behind family all the time. Including spouses and children. And they establish another one in America, in order, of course to have an citizen baby.
Illegal immigrants are perfectly free to take their children with them to their country of origin. Those children aren't chained to the US.
And anyone who thinks they are, give credence to the term "anchor baby" don't they?
Oh boo hoo, this illegal immigrant was caught driving without a license. My heart weeps.
There have been over twenty hit and run accidents over the last few months just in MY neighborhood of N. Hollywood, CA alone. In which there were fatalities.
It may or many not have been an illegal immigrant. It's most likely someone who was driving without a license.
The fact is WE DON'T KNOW because illegal immigrants are off the grid.
ANYONE, not just illegal immigrants who drive without a license, insurance and registration are ALL subject to some kind of punishment.
Illegal immigrant crying unfair offend.
At a point when a person living in this country thinks they shouldn't be held accountable for what ALL citizens are punished for, it's not a matter of civil or human rights.
It's a matter of people who refuse to abide by ANY laws set forth for respectful visitors AND citizens and it signals people who don't want to be either.
Know the difference.
