Interior Enforcement
Groups Sue Federal Government over Failure to Provide Legal Representation for Children
The American Civil Liberties Union, American Immigration Council, Northwest Immigrant Rights Project, Public Counsel, and K&L Gates LLP today filed a nationwide class-action lawsuit on behalf of thousands of children who are challenging the federal government's failure to provide them with legal representation as it carries out deportation hearings against them. Read More
Legal Concerns Push Counties to Limit ICE Detainers
Doña Ana County in New Mexico announced this week it will stop honoring detainer requests from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials at the county jail, becoming the most recent in a string of local jurisdictions across the country to limit their compliance with detainers. Read More
Over 100 Cities and Counties Now Riding the Anti-Detainer Wave
There have been four recent federal court decisions ruling that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents cannot require local jurisdictions to detain someone and that local law enforcement can be held liable for holding someone for no reason other than an ICE detainer. ICE… Read More
Counties Limit ICE Detainers As DHS Secretary Says He’s Taking a ‘Fresh Look’
As a growing number of states and counties end or limit their cooperation with immigration detainers, Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said Thursday that he is taking a “fresh look” at Secure Communities, a program that started in 2008 that allows local law enforcement to share fingerprints… Read More
Understanding ICE’s Release of Immigrants with Criminal Convictions
Washington D.C. – Understanding the complexities of immigration law and its intersection with criminal law is not easy. Over the past month, a flood of reports about enforcement policies and deportation data have compounded the confusion. Some of these reports were clearly designed to derail genuine and productive… Read More
Removal Without Recourse: The Growth of Summary Deportations from the United States
The deportation process has been transformed drastically over the last two decades. Today, two-thirds of individuals deported are subject to what are known as “summary removal procedures,” which deprive them of both the right to appear before a judge and the right to apply for status in the United States. In 1996, as part of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRIRA), Congress established streamlined deportation procedures that allow the government to deport (or “remove”) certain noncitizens from the United States without a hearing before an immigration judge. Two of these procedures, “expedited removal” and “reinstatement of removal,” allow immigration officers to serve as both prosecutor and judge—often investigating, charging, and making a decision all within the course of one day. These rapid deportation decisions often fail to take into account many critical factors, including whether the individual is eligible to apply for lawful status in the United States, whether he or she has long-standing ties here, or whether he or she has U.S.-citizen family members. In recent years, summary procedures have eclipsed traditional immigration court proceedings, accounting for the dramatic increase in removals overall. As the chart below demonstrates, since 1996, the number of deportations executed under summary removal procedures—including expedited removal, reinstatement of removal, and stipulated removal (all described below)—has dramatically increased. In Fiscal Year (FY) 2013, more than 70 percent of all people Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) deported were subject to summary removal procedures. Expedited Removal (INA § 235(b)) Read More
Growing Number of Localities Limit Detention of Immigrants
At least 14 counties in Oregon have stopped honoring detainer requests from federal immigration officials. Their decisions followed a federal court ruling that officials in Clackamas County “violated one woman’s Fourth Amendment rights by holding her for immigration authorities without probable cause,” according to the Oregonian. Maria… Read More
The Challenge of Measuring Immigration Enforcement in the United States
The effectiveness of immigration enforcement policies in the United States cannot simply be reduced to removal numbers. In other words, the system’s functionality and fairness cannot be determined by counting how many individuals a president deports each year. An honest analysis should include an understanding of what belies the… Read More
New Report from Center for Immigration Studies on Deportation Data Misleads and Misinforms
Washington D.C. – Today the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) released a new report that makes a range of false claims about deportation data. Following is a statement from Benjamin Johnson, Executive Director of the American Immigration Council, in response to “Catch and Release: Interior Immigration Enforcement in 2013” “A… Read More
Circuit Court Ruling Affirms Detainers Not Mandatory
As communities continue to debate the harmful impact of large scale immigration enforcement programs such as Secure Communities, the 287(g) Program and the Criminal Alien Program, much of the discussion has centered on the use of “detainers… Read More
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