Criminal Aliens - LA Progressive

Deportations: Filling Quotas or Setting Priorities?

Michele Waslin: It should raise eyebrows when ICE claims it’s falling behind on deportations and needs to deport more people.

Homeland Security Report Ducks Secure Communities Concerns

By Michele Waslin

Michele Waslin: Reports failed to address serious concerns including racial profiling, the impact on community/police relations, and the deportation of individuals with no criminal background.

Ten Years After 9/11, Is the U.S. Deporting Those Who Threaten to Do Us Harm?

By Michele Waslin

Michele Waslin: Confirming what advocates had reported, while the overall number of deportations has increased, the actual numbers of deportations of terrorists, national security threats, and criminals have declined.

Baca on Secure Communities

By Michele Waslin

Michele Waslin: Baca said that ICE has the ability to deport an immigrant, regardless of a criminal conviction, and he has no problem with people being deported after being charged with traffic violations.

Brewer Countersues Feds

By Andrea Christina Nill

Andrea Nill: Gov. Jan Brewer (R-AZ) announced that she is filing a countersuit against the federal government on behalf of the state of Arizona. The countersuit names several counts, including a “failure to protect Arizona from invasion.”

Napolitano Announces Next Steps for Southwest Border

By Seth Hoy

Seth Hoy: Although Secretary Napolitano trumpeted DHS’s new border initiatives as well as past achievements, she also acknowledged that the border can never be hermetically sealed and that stalling immigration reform by highlighting border security issues is not the answer to our immigration problems.

ICE Slip Up Casts Serious Doubt on Immigration Enforcement Strategy

By Michele Waslin

Michele Waslin: Until we have comprehensive immigration reform, ICE is going to be saddled with an enormous list of targets, and many people watching to see how they’re going to tackle it. If they want big numbers, they can achieve big numbers. But that won’t make us any safer or make the system any better. In any case the Administration and ICE have to figure out what their enforcement strategy is, articulate it clearly and consistently, and resist the urge to change it on a dime to please “enforcement-only” types who will never support comprehensive reform.

The Criminal Alien Program: Big, Old, and Misunderstood

By Michele Waslin

Michele Waslin: Of course, identifying and removing dangerous criminal threats must be a priority for ICE. However, time and time again data show that their methods for prioritizing these individuals are flawed and have negative consequences for noncriminals who get caught in the system.

Is Secure Communities Making our Communities Secure?

By Michele Waslin

A new IPC report, The Secure Communities Program: Unanswered Questions and Continuing Concerns, released today highlights early evidence from Secure Communities—and experience with other ICE programs—that suggests this new program may not be living up to its name and may not be effectively making our communities more safe.

Does ICE’s Criminal Alien Program (CAP) Target Serious Criminals?

By Michele Waslin

While ICE claims they are targeting serious criminals, the majority of persons ICE identifies and deports do not actually have any serious criminal records.