Written By ESR News Blog Editor Thomas Ahearn
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has released immigration enforcement statistics for Fiscal Year (FY) 2017 that are available at “ICE Impact in FY 2017” and reveal that ICE totaled 143,473 administrative arrests in FY 2017, with 110,568 of those arrests occurring after start of the Administration of President Donald Trump on January 20, 2017, a 42 percent increase over the same time period in FY 2016.
The statistics show interior removals were also higher in FY 2017 – from October 1, 2016 to September 30, 2017 – than in FY 2016. ICE removed more than 81,000 aliens from the interior of the country, with more than 61,000 of those removals occurring after January 20, 2017, an increase of 37 percent over the same time period in FY 2016. The number of countries not cooperating in the return of nationals fell from 12 to nine.
As directed by an executive order issued by President Trump in January 2017, ICE no longer exempts any category of removable aliens from potential enforcement and focuses on enforcing the law and securing the border of the United States. While this year’s results reflect progress, ICE Deputy Director and Senior Official Performing the Duties of Director Tom Homan stated that there was more work to accomplish.
“There’s much more to do. We need to maintain the dedication shown by our personnel by matching it with more staffing resources. We need to address misguided policies and loopholes that only serve as pull factors for more illegal immigration,” Homan stated in the report. “Throughout the organization, our deportation officers and special agents succeeded across a broad range of initiatives and operations.”
ICE enforcement and investigative activities are handled by two distinct directorates – the Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) – and 92 percent of aliens arrested by ICE in FY 2017 had criminal convictions, pending criminal charges, were an immigration fugitive, or were an illegal re-entrant. More statistics about ICE in FY 2017 are at www.ice.gov/topics/fy2017.
In October 2017, ESR News reported that Homan instructed the HSI to potentially quadruple worksite enforcement actions in 2018 when he ordered the time spent by HSI on worksite enforcement to increase “by four to five times” and also said the number of inspections in worksite operations “would significantly increase this next fiscal year” while speaking at an event focused on enforcing immigration laws.
In October 2017, ESR News also reported that ICE and HIS helped the Department of Justice (DOJ) during a lengthy audit and investigation spanning 6 years that resulted in a tree trimming company – one of the largest privately-held companies in the United States – pleading guilty to unlawfully employing illegal workers and agreeing to pay $95,000,000, the largest payment ever levied in an immigration case.
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) – the largest investigative agency in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) – enforces federal laws governing border control, customs, trade, and immigration to promote homeland security and public safety. ICE has more than 20,000 employees in more than 400 offices in the United States and 46 foreign countries. For more information about ICE, visit www.ice.gov.
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