ICE is in the streets. President Trump is tweeting away. And rumors are flying. None of this is surprising. On the campaign trail, President Trump turned his consistent demonization of migrants into a cornerstone of his victory. Since taking office, he has not relented. On Sunday, the President tweeted, “The crackdown on illegal criminals is merely the keeping of my campaign promise. Gang members, drug dealers & others are being removed!” Meanwhile, word-of-mouth reports and social media are supplying a stream of reports about immigration enforcement actions. Many turn out to be [...]
Must local police work for ICE?
Donald Trump has made no secret of his desire to attack communities that resist his hateful rhetoric about migrants. In particular, he has repeatedly stated that he will work with Congress to cut off federal funding to so-called “sanctuary cities.” Like with much else, he hasn’t bothered to tell us what he means by a sanctuary city. That term is thrown around so much that without a working definition, it is hard to make sense of which cities might come under attack by a Trump anti-sanctuary move. As I wrote in Crimmigration Law, though “sanctuary policies” take a variety of forms, “they all [...]
20 years ago this week…
On September 30, 1996, crimmigration law became firmly embedded in the modern United States. That day, the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRIRA) took effect. Adopted by a Republican Congress and signed by President Bill Clinton, IIRIRA stands as an example of bipartisan willingness to ratchet up the severity of violating immigration law. With Friday’s twentieth anniversary on my mind, I thought it worthwhile to revisit IIRIRA’s specific provisions and contextualize it within a larger string of strong-armed legislation that launched the crimmigration era. First [...]
Obama’s new DHS budget reflects security focus
President Obama released the final budget request he will make to Congress earlier this month and the pitch for DHS is peppered with costly security measures that fall in line with the department’s existing operations centered on security concerns. At almost $41 billion, the DHS budget request covers everything from FEMA operations to the nation’s principal immigration law enforcement bodies, ICE and CBP. U.S. Dep’t of Homeland Security, Budget-in-Brief: Fiscal Year 2017, at 1 (2016). Combined, the budgets for ICE and CBP comprise almost one-third (30.3 percent) of DHS’ total budget, including [...]
Migrants, detainers, & sanctuary cities
The unfortunate death of thirty-two year old Kathryn Steinle in San Francisco allegedly at the hands of a man lacking permission to be in the United States has reignited old refrains about migrant illegality and border insecurity. Coming on the heels of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s infamous claims that many Mexican migrants are rapists or drug dealers, this sad affair has thrown political commentators and politicians into a tizzy about migrant criminality. As could be expected, Republicans have jumped on this event, the facts of which remain very unclear, to repeat their [...]
PEP vs. Secure Communities
Last November, Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson announced the end of the Secure Communities program. Beloved by the Obama Administration, Secure Communities (often described simply as S-Comm) came under heavy criticism by advocates, state and local lawmakers, and police officials. Whatever victory advocates could celebrate was short lived. In the same memo in which Johnson announced S-Comm’s demise, he added that DHS would replace it with a new initiative called the Priority Enforcement Program (PEP). Since then advocates and scholars have been trying to figure out how PEP differs [...]
7 Cir: Time in immigration detention can lead to reduced criminal sentence; cites me
In an interesting twist to the old story of civil and criminal immigration law enforcement overlap, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently concluded that time spent in civil immigration detention can be considered when determining a sentence for a federal immigration crime. United States v. Estrada-Mederos, No. 14-2417, slip op. (7th Cir. April 29, 2015). The Seventh Circuit held that a sentencing judge could view the time spent under ICE’s custody as the basis for granting a convicted migrant a downward departure from the sentencing range for illegal reentry. This case [...]
Immigration detainer workshop
Immigration detainers are a key feature of current-day crimmigration law enforcement. They enable ICE to identify and apprehend potentially removable individuals who come into contact with local law enforcement agencies across the United States. In recent years, ICE has used detainers quite vigorously. From October 2011 to August 2013, the agency issued 436,478 detainers. Immigration detainers essentially ask local law enforcement agencies such as sheriffs’ offices to hold a potentially removable migrant for up to 48 hours after the end of the criminal matter. For example, 48 hours after a [...]