Posts

Lamar Smith Calls ICE Release of 36,000 Criminal Immigrants A President-Sanctioned Prison Break

/2 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

By Caroline May.

Texas Republican Rep. Lamar Smith reacted harshly to a new report detailing the crimes committed by 36,007 criminal immigrants that Immigration and Customs Enforcement released last year.

“This would be considered the worst prison break in American history, except it was sanctioned by the President and perpetrated by our own immigration officials. These criminal immigrants should have been deported to ensure that they could never commit crimes on U.S. soil. But instead, ICE officials chose not to detain them and instead released them back onto American streets,” Smith said in a statement Monday.

An internal Department of Homeland Security document obtained by the Center for Immigration Studies, a limited immigration group, and shared with Breitbart News Monday revealed that last year ICE released 36,007 criminal immigrants who had nearly 88,000 convictions.

The document further broke down the crimes and number of convictions – including 193 homicide convictions, 426 sexual assault convictions, 303 kidnapping convictions, and 1,075 aggravated assault convictions.

Read more from this story HERE.

_______________________________________________________________________________

criminal-illegal-aliensRelease of 36,000 criminal illegals impeachable offense?

By WND.

The reported release last year of more than 36,000 criminal illegal aliens is part of a larger annual trend of thousands of such releases since 2009, according to the authors of a book documenting the case for impeaching President Obama.

The Obama administration’s release of the criminals, in numbers larger than what is publicly known, has generating crime waves and serves as a clear and present danger to the public, argue New York Times bestselling authors Aaron Klein and Brenda J. Elliott in their book “Impeachable Offenses: The Case to Remove Barack Obama from Office.”

On Monday, a Center for Immigration Studies report found that in 2013 the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, or ICE, released violent criminals, including murderers, rapists, kidnappers and drug dealers.

The offenders were among the 36,007 criminal illegal aliens released last year who committed 87,818 crimes, including 15,635 for driving while intoxicated.

The statistics shows ICE released illegals jailed for 9,187 dangerous drug infractions, 426 sexual assault convictions, 303 kidnapping convictions, 193 homicide convictions, 1,317 domestic violence convictions and 1,075 aggravated assault convictions.

Read more from this story HERE.

US Weighs Curbing Deportations

/5 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP / Evan Vucci

Photo Credit: AP / Evan Vucci

Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson is weighing limiting deportations of immigrants living in the U.S. illegally who don’t have serious criminal records, according to two people with knowledge of his deliberations.

The change, if adopted following an ongoing review ordered by President Barack Obama, could shield tens of thousands of immigrants now removed each year solely because they committed repeat immigration violations, such as re-entering the country illegally after having been deported, failing to comply with a deportation order or missing an immigration court date.

However, it would fall short of the sweeping changes sought by activists. They want Obama to expand a two-year-old program that grants work permits to certain immigrants brought here illegally as children to include other groups, such as the parents of any children born in the U.S.

John Sandweg, who served until February as acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said he had promoted the policy change for immigrants without serious criminal records before his departure and that it was being weighed by Johnson. An immigration advocate who’s discussed the review with the administration also confirmed the change was under consideration. The advocate spoke on condition of anonymity because the proceedings are confidential.

Read more from this story HERE.

__________________________________________________________________________________

Photo Credit: Alex Leary / The Tampa Bay Times / AP

Photo Credit: Alex Leary / The Tampa Bay Times / AP

Immigration reform: If Obama moves on his own, how big a political risk?

By Linda Feldmann.

President Obama has long insisted he does not have the power to waive deportations of illegal immigrants on his own.

But under pressure from political allies, Mr. Obama may be headed for some changes of immigration policy via the Department of Homeland Security. DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson is considering limiting deportations of undocumented immigrants who do not have serious criminal records, the Associated Press reported Monday.

Obama set the stage for the reported recommendations last month, when he ordered Secretary Johnson to review how current immigration law is implemented, with an eye toward conducting enforcement “more humanely,” as the White House put it.

The change of policy, if adopted, “could shield tens of thousands of immigrants now removed each year solely because they committed repeat immigration violations, such as reentering the country illegally after having been deported, failing to comply with a deportation order, or missing an immigration court date,” the AP reported.

Read more from this story HERE.

Sen. Sessions: ‘Deliberate Plan by President’ to Collapse U.S. Law Enforcement System (+video)

/6 Comments/in , /by

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) said today that Americans need to stand up to “a deliberate plan by the president of the United States” to collapse the nation’s law enforcement system regarding illegal immigration.

In a Senate speech, Sessions said:

“Our law enforcement system is in a state of collapse, and it’s a deliberate plan by the president of the United States, and it’s wrong. And, people need to be aware of it and need to stand up to it and I believe the American people are beginning to do so.”

Read more from this story HERE.

Most Illegals Have ‘Close to Zero’ Chance of Being Deported…

/3 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: John Moore / Getty Images

Photo Credit: John Moore / Getty Images

Immigration activists have sharply criticized President Obama for a rising volume of deportations, labeling him the “deporter in chief” and staging large protests that have harmed his standing with some Latinos, a key group of voters for Democrats.

But the portrait of a steadily increasing number of deportations rests on statistics that conceal almost as much as they disclose. A closer examination shows that immigrants living illegally in most of the continental U.S. are less likely to be deported today than before Obama came to office, according to immigration data.

Expulsions of people who are settled and working in the United States have fallen steadily since his first year in office, and are down more than 40% since 2009.

On the other side of the ledger, the number of people deported at or near the border has gone up — primarily as a result of changing who gets counted in the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency’s deportation statistics.

The vast majority of those border crossers would not have been treated as formal deportations under most previous administrations. If all removals were tallied, the total sent back to Mexico each year would have been far higher under those previous administrations than it is now.

Read more from this story HERE.

Report: U.S. Releases 1 in 3 Illegal Immigrants Convicted of Crimes

/1 Comment/in , /by

Photo Credit: Bruce Chambers / ZUMApress / Newscom

Photo Credit: Bruce Chambers / ZUMApress / Newscom

Federal immigration officials last year charged only one of every four “deportable” illegal immigrants and released more than a third of those convicted of crimes, according to a new report based on data from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) itself.

ICE agents last year “charged only 195,000 or 25 percent, out of 722,000 potentially deportable aliens they encountered,” the report by the Center for Immigration Studies said. ICE released 68,000 illegal immigrants convicted of criminal offenses, “or 35 percent of the criminal aliens encountered by officers.”

Although the Obama administration frequently cites record-breaking deportation numbers, the report reflects what Republican lawmakers have said is a 40 percent drop in deportations from the interior of the country (as opposed to turn-backs at the border) since 2009.

“The Obama administration consistently claims that it must selectively enforce the law because of a lack of resources,” Heritage Foundation homeland security analyst David Inserra told The Foundry. “Yet President Obama has consistently sought to cut ICE’s budget, indicating that the administration clearly does not prioritize the enforcement of U.S. immigration laws.”

Under the administration’s use of prosecutorial discretion, report author Jessica M. Vaughan writes, ICE officers are instructed “to release illegal aliens if the alien is a parent or caregiver; if the alien claims to be in school; if the alien has been here a long time; or if the alien claims to be eligible for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.”

ICE officers also are instructed “to ignore convictions for state crimes if the conviction occurred under a state law that the administration opposes or thinks is too harsh.”

Vaughan, director of policy studies at the nonpartisan, nonprofit Center for Immigration Studies, said in the report that the administration hopes to “focus its limited resources on convicted criminals” by directing ICE officers not to deport “illegal aliens who have been previously deported, who are fugitives, or who have skipped immigration hearings.”

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), a sharp critic of the administration’s immigration policies, was not available for comment to The Foundry. However, in a statement released yesterday regarding ICE’s parent agency, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Sessions said:

“The preponderance of the evidence demonstrates that immigration enforcement in America has collapsed. Even those with criminal convictions are being released. DHS is a department in crisis. Secretary [Jeh] Johnson must reject the president’s demands to weaken enforcement further and tell him that his duty, and his officers’ duty, is to enforce the law—not break it.”

To the benefit of illegal immigrants, the new report notes, “family relationships, political considerations, attention from advocacy groups, and other factors not related to public safety can trump even serious criminal convictions and result in the termination of a deportation case.”

Under the administration’s enforcement policies, ICE officers “are not permitted to file charges against aliens who do not fall into the administration’s narrowly defined criteria for enforcement, regardless of the criminal charges or the circumstances in which the alien was identified.”

It’s not a reassuring picture, Heritage’s Inserra said:

“ICE officers and law enforcement officers around the country stand ready to enforce our laws, but are being prevented from doing so by executive fiats issued by the Obama administration.”

This story was produced by The Foundry’s news team. Nothing here should be construed as necessarily reflecting the views of The Heritage Foundation.

This article originally appeared at Heritage.com and is re-published in full with the Heritage Foundation’s permission.

Report: Obama Admin Released Tens Of Thousands Of Illegal Immigrant Criminals

/2 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

President Obama’s Department of Homeland Security caught then released 68,000 aliens who had previously been convicted of a crime, a new report from the Center for Immigration Studies shows.

The report, provided to Breitbart News ahead of its late Sunday evening release, reviews internal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) metrics to conclude that the Obama administration released 35 percent—or 68,000—convicted criminal aliens back into the U.S. general population when they could have been deported. “The criminal alien releases typically occur without formal notice to local law enforcement agencies and victims,” CIS’s Jessica Vaughan, the report’s author, added.

By “criminal,” ICE means people who have been convicted of a misdemeanor or felony that is not a traffic violation. For instance, traffic violations like Driving Under the Influence of Alcohol or even vehicular manslaughter do not count toward this description of “criminal alien.” As for the definition of “alien,” ICE mostly means illegal aliens, though some are legal aliens when they are considered deportable legal aliens—which is possible for legal immigrants who have committed a serious crime, like a felony.

The documents also show ICE only deported a small fraction of the aliens they encountered overall.

“In 2013, ICE targeted only 195,000, or 25 percent, out of 722,000 potentially deportable aliens they encountered,” CIS’s Vaughan wrote. “Most of these aliens came to ICE’s attention after incarceration for a local arrest.”

Read more from this story HERE.

Coming Soon: DMV Facility Solely for Illegal Immigrants

/4 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: Tomas / Creative Commons

Photo Credit: Tomas / Creative Commons

Lompoc is slated to house a DMV processing center for undocumented immigrant driving privilege applications later this year. The state will start issuing those cards in January 2015. A building on North H Street, which has been vacant for a very long time, will house the facility according to Mayor John Linn.

The DMV location will serve as a regional center, taking applications from a broad geographic area, including San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara and Ventura Counties.

Read more from this story HERE.

Illegal Immigrants Released Into Texas to Ease Over-Crowding of Detention Centers

/1 Comment/in , /by

Photo Credit: Breitbart

Photo Credit: Breitbart

By Logan Churchwell.

U.S. Border Patrol agents, in conjunction with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) recently disclosed the increasing practice of releasing “low threat” illegal immigrant detainees to address the over-crowding of immigration detention centers in south Texas, according to official confirmation of local reports.

One south Texas television station, KRGV, recently reported instances of women and minors claiming to have been recently released from immigration officials with “documents that allow [them] to travel anywhere in the United States.” Released individuals claimed their federal instructions stated they were not legally allowed to work and could be subject to further immigration hearings. The report claimed that most individuals interviewed and released were of Central and South American origins other than Mexico.

A spokesperson for the U.S. Border Patrol recently confirmed such anecdotal evidence to be part of a larger strategy to focus resources away from individuals “posing no threat to national security.”

“In an effort to maximize resources and focus on the uptick in apprehensions, RGV Border Patrol Sector has begun implementing several steps,” a Border Patrol statement read. “These efforts include, transporting detainees to other sectors within the South Texas Campaign AOR, temporary reassignment of agents from other sectors into RGV and temporarily issuing a notice to appear for immigration hearings to family units posing no threat to national security.”

Read more from this story HERE.

_________________________________________________________________________________

Sessions Report Demolishes Obama ‘Deporter In Chief’ Myth

By Matthew Boyle.

Fully 98 percent of individuals deported from the United States in 2013 were either criminals, apprehended while illegally crossing the border, or had been previously deported, according to a new analysis from Senate Budget Committee ranking member Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL).

The three-page document, labeled a “Critical Alert” by the senator’s office, found three executive actions by President Barack Obama providing amnesty to groups of illegal aliens meant that virtually no one who did not meet other criteria beyond simply being in the country illegal was deported.

“The evidence reveals that the Administration has carried out a dramatic nullification of federal law,” Sessions said in a statement to Breitbart News. “Under the guise of setting ‘priorities’, the Administration has determined that almost anyone in the world who can enter the United States is free to illegally live, work and claim benefits here as long as they are not caught committing a felony or other serious crime.

Obama’s well-known executive action granted virtual amnesty to so-called DREAMers – individuals who claim to have entered the country as minors under their parents’ guidance.

Two are lesser known executive actions include an Aug. 23, 2013, DHS directive “expanding that [summer 2012 executive DREAM Act] amnesty to illegal immigrant relatives of DREAM Act beneficiaries” and a Dec. 21, 2012, DHS directive “reinforcing that almost all immigration offenses were unenforceable absent a separate criminal conviction.”

Read more from this story HERE.

DHS Tells American Border Guards to Run Away from Illegal Immigrants Hurling Rocks at Them, Fleeing in Vehicles

/13 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: Daily Caller Top administration officials have directed 21,000 border patrol officers to retreat whenever illegal immigrants throw rocks at them, and to avoid getting in front of foreign drug-smugglers’ vehicles as they head north with their drug cargoes.

“Agents shall not discharge firearms in response to thrown or hurled projectiles… agents should obtain a tactical advantage in these situations, such as seeking cover or distancing themselves,” said the instructions, issued Mar. 7, under the signature of Michael Fisher, chief of U.S. Border Patrol.

Agents were also directed to keep their weapons holstered when drug smugglers drive by.

Agents can’t use guns against “a moving vehicle merely fleeing from agents,” say the instructions.

The new instructions do allow agents to use guns to defend themselves from vehicles that drive at them. “Agents shall not discharge their firearms at a moving vehicle unless the agent has a reasonable belief that… deadly force is being used against an agent,” the new instructions say.

Read more this story HERE.

California Bill Seeks to Extend Subsidized Health Care to Illegal Immigrants

/2 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: REUTERS/Lucy NicholsonA California Democrat is looking to extend taxpayer-funded health-care benefits to illegal immigrants.

State Sen. Ricardo Lara of Long Beach introduced legislation late last week that would extend health-care coverage to all Californians “irrespective of immigration status.”

“The purpose of the Health For All Act is simple — provide health care coverage to California’s remaining uninsured by expanding Medi-Cal and creating a new health exchange where the undocumented can purchase coverage,” Lara said in a statement.

Read more this story HERE.