Earlier today, President Trump asked Congress to find $3 billion in funding to pay for the president’s immigration executive orders through the end of September 2017. This request comes as an addition to the billions of dollars Congress has already given the Department of Homeland Security for fiscal year 2017 operations. In particular, the White House requests supplemental funds to pay for the border wall, an expansion to ICE’s immigration detention system, and to prepare to hire more Border Patrol and ICE agents. As the president’s most expensive immigration policing project, the [...]
DHS issues border policing plans
In response to President Trump’s January 25 executive order on border policing, the Department of Homeland Security issued a memo with details about how it plans to carry out the president’s directives. The memo promises to further militarize the Mexican border, expand the nation’s already unprecedented immigration detention capacity, and skirt the immigration court system. Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly signed the memo, titled “Implementing the President’s Border Security and Immigration Enforcement Improvements Policies,” on February 20, 2017. The memo consists of instructions [...]
Removals & returns, 1892-2015
As we begin to become immersed in immigration law enforcement practices under President Trump, I thought a look back at historical practices might be helpful. The information below comes entirely from DHS statistics. President Obama’s enforcement record is familiar to crimmigration.com readers. From fiscal years 2009 to 2015, the United States removed 2,749,854 people and returned another 2,080,307. No data are available for President Obama’s last full fiscal year, FY 2016. As defined by DHS for purposes of these statistics, “Removals are the compulsory and confirmed movement of an [...]
Executive orders on crime include plenty about immigration
President Trump issued three more executive orders on Thursday, this time focusing his attention squarely on crime. Immigration occupies a central position in this latest EO trilogy, illustrating the Trump Administration’s immigration mindset. I printed the orders at random and didn’t make it through the first section before “illegal immigration” made an appearance. The EO titled “Task Force on Crime Reduction and Public Safety” states that it is the Trump Administration’s policy to “enforc[e] the law and develop[] policies that comprehensively address illegal immigration, drug trafficking, [...]
Immigration policing in the age of Trump–early signs
Donald Trump was still standing on the Capitol’s steps waiting to be sworn in as the nation’s forty-fifth president when the White House website announced its plans for immigration. Squarely positioned as a law enforcement matter, President Trump views immigration, the website suggests, as equivalent to rioting and homicides. Much has been written about the White House website shedding all references to climate change. At the same time, the Trump Administration’s digital home launched six issue areas that presumably we can expect to occupy the Administration’s early days. Among those is a [...]
New detention facility opens
Customs and Border Protection recently opened a new detention center in South Texas equipped to hold as many as 1,000 migrants. The facility, located outside the small town of Donna and adjacent to a bridge connecting Texas to the Mexican state of Tamaulipas, consists of a large canvas structure resembling a tent. CBP officials explained that they need additional confinement capacity to hold migrants, especially those coming from Central America. Officials claim that migrants will be detained at the Donna site for no more than 72-hours. News reports peg the facility’s cost at approximately [...]
Narratives of criminalization and resistance
“Immigrants are not criminals.” This was a frequent refrain of the mass mobilizations of 2006 that put a stop to the harshest immigration legislation to win widespread congressional support in a decade. Many immigrants’ rights advocates continued using a form of this narrative frame in the years that followed. So too did Obama Administration officials. Under his watch, ICE repeatedly touted its prioritization of “criminal aliens.” Indeed, President Obama famously described his Administration’s immigration law enforcement focus as “felons, not families.” Whatever the rhetoric’s value, the [...]
Reflections on a Donald Trump Presidency
By Linus Chan Bearing witness to sorrow, pain and injustice has always been part of the package deal of being an immigration attorney. Immigration law is diverse, rich and an example of how to define what our country's values are. Deciding who can be our neighbors, co-workers, teachers, and family often requires us to articulate our vision of the United States and how it is to remain a shining light on a hill. I represent non-citizens detained by immigration officials and who face removal from our country and exile from their homes and family. Many of my clients are those people [...]