Record deportations

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April 17, 2012 | 11:28 AM | By

Skeptical reaction to Obama’s second-term immigration reform promise

One impressive thing about President Obama’s recent pledge that he’d try to get comprehensive immigration reform passed in his second term if reelected, made during a televised interview with the Spanish-language Univision network, is the seemingly bipartisan nature of the unhappy reactions that skeptics have been posting online.

During a network interview Friday, Obama said: “I can promise that I will try to do it in the first year of my second term. I want to try this year. The challenge we’ve got on immigration reform is very simple. I’ve got a majority of Democrats who are prepared to vote for it, and I’ve got no Republicans who are prepared to vote for it.”

A good intention perhaps, but much of the online reaction since has tended to bring up where the road paved with good intentions leads to. During Obama’s first term, immigration reform efforts like the Dream Act have failed while enforcement-based policies like the controversial Secure Communities fingerprint-sharing program have stuck, contributing to record deportations.

The end result, if reaction to Obama’s statement is any indication, is skepticism from voters who had hoped for comprehensive immigration reform by now – and jeers from those who don’t support it. On both right- and left-leaning websites, critics have been recalling similar campaign promises in 2008 and dismissing Obama’s statement as election-year pandering, with reactions ranging from yawns to snark. Here are a few comments from a handful of sites.

Under a piece in the left-leaning Firedoglake, GlenJo wrote:

Wow, this from the guy that deports more people than Bush.

What won’t he say to get votes?

What will he do once he gets them?

And this one from Charles, posted in the conservative National Journal:

Bo panders to hispanics, Promises amnesty for illegal alien lawbreakers. Does this radical have no shame.

On the left-leaning social justice magazine site ColorLines, which posted a story yesterday, Noreformboycottcensus posted:

“I can promise that I will try to do …” What a bunch of BS. We heard it all before. Obama had 2 years of Democratic majority in Congress and still he choose not to work on immigration reform. Obama, give us a reason to vote for you other that “Republicans are even worth”.

And under a piece in the conservative Hot Air blog (which also featured comments along the lines of “half your family is here illegally”) Nethicus wrote:

Manager to Employee: Look, you really haven’t done anything for the company in the past 3 years, except spend lots of money and actually hurt our bottom line. So don’t expect to work here in November.

Employee: Wait! You don’t want to do that. I have great plans for my contributions to the company after November!

Manager: Why didn’t you do that stuff the past 3 years?

Employee: Look out! Paul Ryan is pushing your grandmother off a cliff! *runs*

Of course, passing comprehensive immigration reform is no easy task, and it does require bipartisan support. Reform proposals under the Bush administration faltered also. In the absence of legislative reforms, one thing the Obama administration has done recently is to make small changes, for example, a proposed administrative tweak under U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services that would make it easier for some family members of U.S citizens to legalize.

But the administration’s staunch enforcement record is a difficult hurdle to overcome. Interestingly, the online back-and-forth over Obama’s statement to Univision has been similar to that in a long string of comments under a piece last year in the liberal Daily Kos, which cited past examples of the president’s immigration reform pledges. While some defended Obama, several others then vented frustration with his policies, among them YucatanMan who wrote:

He has zero credibility on immigration after his utterly shattered promises.
Worse, as KOS points out, his administration has vigorously — enthusiastically and viciously — gone after undocumented immigrants who are not guilty of any violent crimes.
We know it.  He knows it. His administration has made the number of deportations an evaluation milestone in the performance appraisals of ICE agents.
It’ll be interesting to see how he tries to salvage this self-created mess.  Broken promises are pretty hard to smooth over. 
FILED UNDER: Immigration reform, President Obama, Record deportations, Secure Communities, Univision
April 4, 2012 | 10:42 AM | By

A growing number of deported parents

Photo by Brian Auer/Flickr (Creative Commons)

A man in Playas de Tijuana, on the other side of the U.S.-Mexico border fence, September 2008

A post last week examined an attempt by some California lawmakers to keep the children of deported immigrants out of foster care, a growing problem as record deportations lead to more separated families. It briefly cited a new federal report on deported parents that had just begun trickling out to legislators.

The details of the report, now making the rounds, are impressive. During the period between January 1, 2011 and June 30, 2011, according to the report, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement removed 46,486 immigrants from the country who claimed to be the parent of at least one U.S. citizen child.

The seven-page report to Congress is part of a federal response to lawmakers seeking more data from ICE on deported parents of U.S. citizen children. Interestingly, it cites a Homeland Security estimate from 2009 that tallied more than 100,000 parents of U.S. citizen children removed between 1998 and 2007. Spread out over several years, that’s a relatively low number in comparison. Since then, as deportations have increased, so naturally have the deportations of parents.

There are several charts, including one listing final orders of deportation obtained for the parents of U.S. citizen children by district (1,496 in Los Angeles over a six month period) and another of final deportation orders sought in that period for parents of U.S. children (39,918 nationwide).

The more than 46,000 removals of parents tracked in the first half of last year include not only formal deportations and removals (including voluntary departures), but expedited removals (which allow people to be removed without the decision of an immigration judge) and exclusions, a term that used to apply to a formal denial of entry, but is now applied to some removal proceedings.

Source: U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement

The emerging crisis as removals have hit record highs under the Obama administration is what to do with the children of the immigrants who are deported or detained. In a best-case scenario, a second parent will remain in the United States, preferably legally, or the children can at least stay with relatives. Other times, deported parents opt to take their U.S.-born children with them.

But when relatives can’t be located, or the parents are shuffled off quickly into the immigrant detention system, the kids can land in foster care. Once this happens, these immigrants can lose their parental rights, as detainees in custody are hard pressed to meet the requirements established by child welfare agencies, such as attending case meetings or court proceedings. If they don’t meet the terms within the timelines set, their parental rights can be terminated.

Last fall, the social justice magazine ColorLines reported that more than 5,000 children were in foster care following the detention or deportation of their immigrant parents.

Earlier this month in California, a state Senate committee voted in favor of a bill that would to help some immigrants in deportation hold onto their children through the process. Known as SB 1064, the bill proposes authorizing courts to extend the review hearing period in child welfare cases involving parents who are immigrant detainees, among other things. Were the bill to become law, it would be the first measure of its kind in the country.

The entire ICE report can be read here.

FILED UNDER: Deportations, Deported parents, Family separation, ICE, Mixed-status families, Record deportations, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
January 4, 2012 | 1:54 PM | By

TRAC vs. ICE: Report claims more disparity in deportation stats

The back-and-forth between immigration authorities and a university center that tracks federal data has become more heated, after Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) sent out a press release today once again accusing the federal government of inflating its deportation statistics and withholding public information.

In a report last month, TRAC accused U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement of inflating its tally of criminal deportations. ICE officials criticized the report as “wildly misleading,” saying that deportees’ criminal histories aren’t always found in administrative removal records, hence the disparity in numbers.

In its release today, TRAC claims that an examination of case-by-case records provided by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) reveals that “many fewer individuals were apprehended, deported or detained by the agency than were claimed in its official statements — congressional testimony, press releases, and the agency’s latest 2010 Yearbook of Immigration Statistics.” From the release:

In its initial FOIA request in May 2010, TRAC asked for specific information about all individuals who had been arrested, detained, charged, returned or removed from the country for the period beginning October 1, 2004 to date. In its initial and incomplete response, however, ICE so far has only provided TRAC with information through FY 2005. The agency said it would provide detailed information about the more recent years later.

When compared with various public statements by the agency, however, TRAC’s analysis of this limited case-by-case information provided found vast discrepancies. Among them: ICE statements claimed almost five times more individual apprehensions than revealed in the data, as well as 24 times more individuals deported and 34 times more detentions.

According to TRAC, its analysis of fiscal year 2005 data counted 6,906 deportations, while ICE logged 166,075. There were similar discrepancies between the official totals for apprehensions (21,339 vs. 102,034) and for immigrants detained (6,778 vs. 233,417).

Why the huge gap?

Last month, ICE officials cited vastly different accounting methods: When counting criminal deportations, for example, the agency includes administrative deportations in which the individual had a past conviction. However, if the crime doesn’t factor into the deportation case, it’s typically not found in the immigration court records, which the TRAC report analyzed. Many immigrants, particularly those who are in the country illegally, are removed solely on administrative grounds, whether or not there’s a criminal history.

TRAC maintained in its release today that “this was not an inconsequential bookkeeping problem.” A statement from ICE is forthcoming. The press release can be viewed here.

ICE’s response: The agency won’t likely have a mathematical explanation for the disparity until tomorrow. However, an agency spokeswoman stressed that ICE is still in the process of releasing data to TRAC. Agency spokeswoman Gillian Christensen said the numbers today were inaccurate and “based on conclusions gathered from an incomplete set of data,” and that ICE “has worked diligently to respond to their requests for extremely large amounts of data and related information.”

“Nevertheless,” she wrote, “ICE is committed to continuing to provide data that confirms the accuracy of the agency’s removal numbers. We stand by our record.”

FILED UNDER: ICE, Record deportations, TRAC, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
December 30, 2011 | 12:34 PM | By

The top five immigration stories of 2011

Photo by Victoria Bernal/Flickr (Creative Commons)

During the past week, Multi-American has been counting down the biggest and most influential immigration stories of 2011. That’s not to say there were only five: It’s been a major year for stories related to the immigration debate, especially as the battleground has shifted to the states, record deportations have continued, and the Obama administration’s expansion of federal-local partnerships such as the Secure Communities fingerprint sharing program continues to draw controversy.

Stories that didn’t make the list are also worth mentioning, among them the passage of state tuition-aid bills for undocumented students like the California Dream Act and the continued steep drop in illegal border crossings – even as illegal immigration remains a popular talking point for candidates seeking the presidency in 2012. Here are M-A’s choices for top stories of the year.

1) The states as immigration battleground: When counting down last year’s top stories, choosing Arizona’s game-changing SB 1070 to top the list was a no-brainer. Not necessarily because news of the stringent 2010 anti-illegal immigration law dominated immigration coverage last year, but because of the lasting impact the law was bound to have on other states.

A year later, SB 1070-inspired immigration enforcement bills have made their way through statehouses around the country. Similarly strict laws have taken effect in states like Alabama, Georgia, Utah, Indiana and South Carolina.

Like the Arizona measure that inspired them, headed to the U.S. Supreme Court on a state appeal, all of these face their own court challenges. Federal judges have blocked several of these laws’ most stringent provisions, including a controversial provision in Alabama that would require public schools to check the immigration status of students, which when the law first took effect prompted a rash of school absences. Agricultural states like Georgia and Alabama, meanwhile, have experienced severe labor shortages as immigrant farm workers have fled their fields for more welcoming climes.

The new laws enacted are but one small aspect of what’s been happening in the states. The National Conference of State Legislatures reported recently that in 2011, there were 1,607 bills and resolutions relating to immigrants and refugees introduced in all 50 states and Puerto Rico, significantly up from a little more than 1,400 in 2010. Bolstered by the relative success of SB 1070, even as parts of the law remain hung up in court, immigration restriction-minded legislators in many states banded together, working with the same legal teams to draft crackdown bills.

Where does it go from here? The Supreme Court decision on SB 1070 could well hold the answer, either encouraging or putting the brakes on state bills. The high court will weigh the merits of a lower court judge’s decision to block some of the more controversial provisions of the law, including one empowering local police to check for immigration status. The case is expected to be heard in the spring.

The high court set a state-law precedent earlier this year when it ruled in favor of a previous Arizona anti-illegal immigration law, a 2007 measure mandating employers to use a federal program called E-Verify to check workers’s immigration status and punishing those who don’t comply. Many of the state laws that have followed SB 1070 have had similar employer provisions, an enforcement tactic that is becoming more popular as states find ways to crack down.

Photo by John Moore/Getty Images

A man is prepared for a deportation flight bound for San Salvador in Mesa, Arizona, December 2010

2) Another year of record deportations: In fiscal year 2011, the Obama administration broke its deportation record for the second straight year, deporting close to 400,000 people in the year that ended last Sept. 30. 

It wouldn’t be a stretch to say that news of another record-breaking year was pretty much expected, with the continued expansion of federal immigration enforcement programs like Secure Communities and 287(g), both of which have fed the deportation pipeline in recent years with a steady flow of cases stemming from local law enforcement. The number of people deported annually has crept upward steadily for years now, from 291,060 in fiscal year 2007 to 396,906 in fiscal year 2011, according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement records.

These deportations have raised several questions, among them questions about just who is being deported as the Obama administration stresses an emphasis on criminal deportees, and whether the programs being used are working as intended. An October press release from ICE read that “nearly 55 percent or 216,698 of the people removed were convicted of felonies or misdemeanors — an 89 percent increase in the removal of criminals since FY 2008.” But analyses of deportation stats have pointed out gray areas.

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Birthright citizenship, Coming out undocumented, Prosecutorial discretion, Record deportations, SB 1070, Secure Communities, Top five immigration stories of 2011
December 29, 2011 | 12:53 PM | By

Top five immigration stories of 2011, #2: More record deportations

Photo by John Moore/Getty Images

A man is prepared for a deportation flight bound for San Salvador in Mesa, Arizona, December 2010

In fiscal year 2011, the Obama administration broke its own deportation record for the second straight year, deporting close to 400,000 people in the year that ended last Sept. 30.

It wouldn’t be a stretch to say that news of another record-breaking year for removals was pretty much expected, with the continued expansion of federal immigration enforcement programs like Secure Communities and 287(g), both of which have fed the deportation pipeline in recent years with a steady flow of cases stemming from local law enforcement.

The number of deportations has crept upward steadily for years now. According to a federal chart, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has removed these many people in recent years:

FY 2010 = 392,862

FY 2009 = 389,834

FY 2008 = 369,221

FY 2007 = 291,060

Still, it’s a story that has legs, as newspaper editors used to say, and which continues to raise questions.

Among these questions is just who being deported, and whether the programs being used are working as intended. The Obama administration has long made a point that its focus is on deporting immigrants (including legal residents) with criminal records. An October press release from ICE read that “nearly 55 percent or 216,698 of the people removed were convicted of felonies or misdemeanors — an 89 percent increase in the removal of criminals since FY 2008.”

But analyses of federal deportation stats have pointed out gray areas. Last summer, an Associated Press analysis revealed that among those counted as criminal deportees are a growing number of people who have been deported following traffic and DUI arrests; the number of those deported following less-serious, non-DUI traffic offenses had close to tripled over a two-year period. From a story in July:

The U.S. deported nearly 393,000 people in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, half of whom were considered criminals.

Of those, 27,635 had been arrested for drunken driving, more than double the 10,851 deported after drunken driving arrests in 2008, the last full year of the Bush administration, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement data provided to The Associated Press.

An additional 13,028 were deported last year after being arrested on less serious traffic law violations, nearly three times the 4,527 traffic offenders deported two years earlier, according to the data.

DUI offenders made up a large number (35,927) of those deported in fiscal year 2011, as did people convicted of drug-related offenses (44,653). Violent offenders (homicide, 1,119; sexual offenses, 5,848) were fewer in number, according to ICE.

As for the non-criminals being deported, some are being ensnared through the methods used to target serious criminals, another criticism of the administration’s enforcement tactics. Reports have indicated that nearly half the immigrants who have been caught up in the embattled Secure Communities program, which allows for biometric data of people fingerprinted in local jails to be shared with immigration officials, have been non-criminals or low-level misdemeanor offenders.

A more recent report from Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) tallied up the criminal charges used in the nation’s immigration courts, coming up with a much lower percentage of criminal charges found in deportation cases. ICE called the analysis “wildly misleading,” attributing the difference to the fact that the agency doesn’t always note prior criminal records in deportation cases. However, these individuals still make the annual criminal tally in the federal deportation stats.

The growing number of deportations has had broader domestic repercussions as more immigrants are sent back to their native countries, among them a growing number of mixed-status or legal-resident families in the U.S. left without a parent (or sometimes both parents), and a growing number of U.S. citizen children of deported parents landing in foster care.

In August, the Obama administration announced that it would review some 300,000 deportation cases to ferret out those deemed a “low priority” for removal under a set of prosecutorial discretion guidelines released by ICE earlier this year, again stating that its focus is on criminals. Among those who could be spared are undocumented immigrants who arrived here as children, college students and graduates, and immigrants with U.S. military ties. The review process is being pilot-tested now.

If the reviews are expanded and some deportation cases are indeed thrown out (though these individuals would still not have legal status – but that’s another story), will it make a dent in the deportation caseload next year? Or will the continued expansion of programs like Secure Communities, which the federal government has declared mandatory and is expected to be operating nationwide by 2013, make for another record year of removals in 2012?

Come back tomorrow for top story #1.

FILED UNDER: 287(g), ICE, Record deportations, Secure Communities, Top five immigration stories of 2011, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
December 28, 2011 | 1:56 PM | By

Top five immigration stories of 2011, #3: Secure Communities

Photo by Corey Moore/KPCC

Anti-Secure Communities protesters in Los Angeles, August 15, 2011

The controversy over the federal immigration enforcement program known as Secure Communitieshas been brewing since not long after it was first implemented 2008, during the waning days of the Bush administration. But after a heated back-and-forth between state, local and federal officials over the program as some jurisdictions attempted to withdraw – only to be told they couldn’t – the controversy came to a head this year.

First, in a nutshell, how Secure Communities works: When state or local authorities book someone into a local jail, the person’s fingerprints are electronically submitted to the FBI. These fingerprints are then sent to the Department of Homeland Security, and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents check them against an immigration records database to determine if the person is deportable (legal residents are also subject to deportation if they have committed certain offenses). The person is then held for deportation by ICE.

Unlike with a similar federal-local partnership known as 287(g), the screening is done pre-conviction, meaning that some people who turn out to be otherwise innocent have landed in the deportation net; some cases have involved domestic violence victims. This has been a sticking point for critics of the program, who say it goes against the Obama administration’s stated goal of focusing on criminals for deportation. Criticism has also come from some law enforcement agencies, state and city officials who complain that because of its nature, the program alienates immigrant communities by undermining trust in police, making policing them more difficult.

Which brings us to this year’s explosive controversy: Several jurisdictions around the country, including the city of San Francisco, began attempting to opt out of the program last year. Many local and state officials had believed that as with 287(g), Secure Communities was optional, as evidenced by a series of internal emails released last spring. After all, federal officials had signed contracts known as Memorandums of Agreement, or MOAs, with state and local officials around the country allowing Secure Communities to be implemented.

Here’s how part of the contract with the California Department of Justice, dated January 23, 2009, reads:

This MOA may be modified at any time by mutual written consent of both parties.

This MOA may remain in effect from the date of signing until it is terminated by either party. Either party, upon written or oral notice to the other party, may terminate the MOA at any time. A termination notice shall be delivered personally or by certified or registered mail and termination shall take effect 30 days after receipt of such notice.

Sounds optional, right? But it isn’t, according to federal officials.

By last summer, the governors of Massachusetts, Illinois and New York had announced plans to withdraw from the program, and California’s state Assembly had passed legislation that would allow the state to renegotiate its Secure Communities contract with Homeland Security, allowing local jurisdictions to opt out.

Then the hammer came down. In August, ICE director John Morton sent out a letter to governors terminating all existing MOAs with the agency regarding Secure Communities. The letter clarified “an issue that has been the subject of substantial confusion,” i.e. that states must participate and have no choice in the matter, according to ICE.

The program has continued to draw harsh criticism, most recently from civil rights advocates angry over U.S. citizens being detained accidentally after being fingerprinted. A recent UC Berkeley Law School report cited as many as 3,600 cases of U.S. citizens having been arrested by ICE as a result of Secure Communities.

The Obama administration continues to support use of Secure Communities, crediting it along with 287(g) in part for continued record deportations, a growing number of which federal officials are counting as removals of people with criminal records. But that’s another story for this week.

Come back tomorrow for top story #2.

FILED UNDER: ICE, Record deportations, Secure Communities, Top five immigration stories of 2011, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
December 7, 2011 | 12:21 PM | By

New report counts fewer criminal deportations; ICE calls analysis ‘misleading’

In October, the Obama administration released deportation statistics indicating that a majority of the record 396,906 people deported in fiscal year 2011, which ended Sept. 30, had criminal records. Nearly 55 percent were counted as being convicted of felonies or misdemeanors, with the percentage of criminal removals overall up 89 percent since 2008.

But the numbers in a new report based on immigration court records from Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) add up differently.

According to the TRAC analysis, of all the deportation proceedings initiated between July and September of this year in the nation’s immigration courts, only 13.8 involved individuals charged with having engaged in criminal activity. The analysis also counts fewer removals involving criminal charges this year, as opposed to fiscal year 2010.

Federal immigration officials, one of whom today called the analysis “wildly misleading,” attribute the difference to the accounting used. First, a table and excerpt from the TRAC report:

Screen shot from trac.syr.edu

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not only has ICE targeted relatively few criminals as the basis for seeking deportation in these court proceedings, but this proportion has been declining steadily throughout the past year: 15.8 percent were charged with engaging in criminal activity during the first quarter period (October – December 2010), 15.1 percent during the second quarter (January – March 2011), 14.9 percent during the third quarter (April – June 2011), and finally 13.8 percent during the fourth quarter (July – September 2011).

The average rate across the four quarters for FY 2011 was 14.9 percent.

Why the lower numbers? According to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the report counts deportation proceedings in which individuals’ criminal records are taken into account. But many immigrants, particularly those who are in the country illegally (versus legal residents), are removed solely on administrative grounds of violating immigration rules, even when immigration authorities are aware there is a prior criminal record.

“TRAC’s report is wildly misleading” wrote ICE spokeswoman Gillian Christensen in an emailed statement. “When removing individuals who have been convicted of a crime and who have no lawful immigration status, like those who illegally cross our border or overstay their visa, ICE is not required to file charging documents in immigration court asserting criminal grounds of removal.”

TRAC maintains in the report that the court data casts doubt on the Obama administration’s assertion that it is effectively targeting criminals. As for “immigration only” charges in deportation proceedings, i.e. administrative removal charges, those account for 83.4 percent of the total in the report, up slightly for fiscal year 2011 over the previous year.

The data in the report is based on case-by-case immigration court records obtained through the Freedom of Information Act from the Executive Office for Immigration Review, which administers the immigration court system.

FILED UNDER: Politics/Justice, Criminal deportations, Deportations, ICE, Record deportations, Syracuse University, TRAC
October 19, 2011 | 12:45 PM | By

Report: Secure Communities affects U.S. citizens, too

Art by José Luís Agapito/Flickr (Creative Commons)

A new report examining Secure Communities, the immigration enforcement program partly responsible for the Obama administration’s record number of deportations, reveals some of the demographics, immigration status, and other key details about who has been arrested and deported under the program since it began rolling out in 2008.

Secure Communities allows for the fingerprints of people booked into local jails to be shared with immigration officials, who are notified when prints match immigration records. The idea is to net undocumented immigrants and deportable legal residents with criminal records, a stated goal of the Obama administration.

But as noted in the report by the UC Berkeley Law School, U.S. citizens are affected by the program in more ways than one might think. Citizens have been arrested, and to a much larger degree, have had family members deported. According to the report, nearly 40 percent of the people arrested by immigration authorities under Secure Communities have been the spouses or parents of U.S. citizens.

From a list of key findings:

• Approximately 3,600 United States citizens have been arrested by ICE through the Secure Communities program.

• More than one-third (39%) of individuals arrested through Secure Communities report that they have a U.S. citizen spouse or child, meaning that approximately 88,000 families with U.S. citizen members have been impacted by Secure Communities.

Among the other key findings: As reported in the New York Times, Latinos are disproportionately affected, with a greater percentage of Latinos arrested through Secure Communities than there are Latino undocumented immigrants (though it’s worth noting that legal U.S. residents with criminal offenses may also be arrested and deported). From the report:

• Latinos comprise 93% of individuals arrested through Secure Communities though they only comprise 77% of the undocumented population in the United States.

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: ICE, Record deportations, Secure Communities, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement