Center for Immigration Studies

Interior enforcement continues to decline

Article title: 
Interior enforcement continues to decline
Article author: 
Jessica Vaughn
Article publisher: 
Center for Immigration Studies
Article date: 
Sat, 07/27/2013
Article importance: 
High
Article body: 

A new report tracking the number of ICE detainers issued confirms that interior immigration enforcement has declined significantly in recent months. This report corroborates my previous analysis of another set of ICE statistics that revealed a considerable deterioration in interior enforcement since 2011.

According to the data provided to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC), a government watchdog project of Syracuse University, this fiscal year ICE is issuing 19 percent fewer detainers than last year. Detainers are formal requests from ICE to another law enforcement agency, usually a local jail, not to release an alien who is in their custody after arrest so that ICE can begin the removal process. Since ICE now limits its interior enforcement to removing only those aliens who have been convicted of other crimes, detainers are a key indicator of interior enforcement activity.
TRAC reports that in the first four months of FY 2013, ICE issued an average of 18,427 detainers per month. In the first four months of FY 2012, ICE issued an average of 22,832 detainers per month.
The total number of detainers issued by ICE in 2012 was 273,982. So far in 2013, ICE has issued 73,709 detainers. At that pace, ICE is on track to issue 220,027 detainers this year; that is, ICE is on track to remove nearly 54,000 fewer criminal aliens than last year. Not very reassuring.

New Report Offers Deceptive Assessment of Immigration Enforcement

Article title: 
New Report Offers Deceptive Assessment of Immigration Enforcement
Article author: 
Jessica Vaughn
Article publisher: 
Center for Immigration Studies
Article date: 
Thu, 01/10/2013
Article importance: 
High
Article body: 

Washington, D.C. (January 10, 2012) - A new report being promoted by the Migration Policy Institute (MPI), a research institute dedicated to promoting migration, paints a deliberately misleading picture of the state of immigration law enforcement. The report, titled Immigration Enforcement in the United States: The Rise of a Formidable Machinery, is presented as an objective assessment of immigration programs, and has been widely covered in the news media -- but is riddled with false statements, cherry-picked statistics, and inappropriate comparisons. This compilation of bogus findings aims to convince opinion leaders and the public that the government has succeeded in creating an effective "bulwark" of immigration enforcement that cannot be improved upon much, and suggests that spending cuts might be in order. MPI, which has close ties to the White House, has issued this report in a transparent attempt to help sell the President's immigration agenda, which includes amnesty for illegal immigrants, further restrictions on immigration enforcement, and expanded legal immigration.

Researchers at the Center for Immigration Studies have found numerous problems in the MPI report.  

Border Incidents Increase in Arizona

Article title: 
Border Incidents Increase in Arizona
Article author: 
Janice Kephart
Article publisher: 
Center for Immigration Studies
Article date: 
Sat, 12/01/2012
Article importance: 
Medium
Article body: 

Janice Kephart is the Director of National Security Policy at the Center for Immigration Studies.

Data gathered by a private organization has documented a sharp rise in illegal entries along the Arizona border.
The non-governmental volunteer group Secure Border Intelligence uses various official and unofficial sources, including hidden cameras, to compile a list of incidents along a portion of Arizona's border with Mexico. All data are verifiable, but confidential, given the sensitive nature of the work.
 
Secure Border Intelligence's footage was used in the Center for Immigration Studies video "Hidden Cameras on the Arizona Border 3: A Day in the Life of a Drug Smuggler" (viewable on the right panel).
This Memorandum attempts to catalogue and analyze the current sharp rise in illegal entries since August in the context of what the president and Congress should consider as the nation launches into another post-campaign season of "let's talk immigration reform".

Illegal Activity Surging since August. From August 1 to September 23, 2012, more than 1,000 incidents occurred in 915 "hot spots" in a small area stretching from the central Arizona border to about 70 miles north to the Interstate 8 east-west highway, crossing north over the Tohono O'odham Indian Reservation to the Barry Goldwater Firing Range and into the Sonoran Desert National Monument. There have been 3,275 incidents from August 1 to October 19. In contrast, just 509 incidents were logged from January through July. 

(Editor's note:  See reference to President Obama's June 15 amnesty for nearly 2 million "Dreamers.")

DOJ gave $62 million to "sanctuary cities"

Article title: 
DOJ gave $62 million to "sanctuary cities"
Article author: 
Russ Doubleday, Jessica Vaughan
Article publisher: 
Center for Immigration Studies
Article date: 
Wed, 11/10/2010
Article importance: 
Medium
Article body: 

The Department of Justice annually awards millions of dollars in grants to local governments to compensate for the cost of jailing illegal aliens, even when those governments have policies obstructing immigration law enforcement or encouraging illegal settlement. In 2010, the grant program, known as the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program (SCAAP), doled out a total of roughly $400 million to about 850 cities, counties, and states.1 Among them were 27 jurisdictions widely considered to be sanctuary jurisdictions, which together received more than $62.6 million, or 15.6 percent of the total (see Table 1). For example, the 2010 SCAAP grantees include some jurisdictions — such as San Francisco, Chicago, Santa Clara County, Calif., and Arlington, Va. — that are trying to opt-out of Secure Communities, the program that automatically flags criminal aliens for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) attention at the time they are booked into jail.2

Subscribe to RSS - Center for Immigration Studies