Immigrant arrests in the United States fell to the lowest level in more than a decade during fiscal year 2021, which began on October 1 of last year and ended on September 30, according to data from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). , for its acronym in English) obtained by The Washington Post.
ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) officers made about 72,000 arrests during the fiscal year just ended, down from 104,000 in fiscal 2020 and an average of 148,000 annually. from 2017 to 2019.
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The figure is about half the annual totals recorded during the administration of former President Donald Trump, when immigration agencies were free to make arrests.
Now, agents are focused on stopping more dangerous criminals, according to ICE officials consulted by the Post.
ICE arrests in the country plummeted after President Biden arrived at the White House and set new limits on immigration laws, including a 100-day hiatus in most deportations, despite little else after that. one month a judge will block that order indefinitely.
Biden's measure, established the same day of the inauguration from a memorandum, paused deportations from Friday, January 22, for those immigrants who entered the United States before November without papers.
Since coming to power, more than 1.7 million people have been detained at the border, tripling the average number of arrests in the years 2012 to 2020, according to CBP data released by the Post
.
Despite this, the levels of application of the new Biden system continue to be lower than in previous years in the country.
During the previous fiscal year, each of the 6,000 ERO agents made an average of 12 immigrant arrests per year, or one per month.
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The high point of ICE policing over the past decade was fiscal year 2011, when ICE made 322,093 administrative arrests, according to the data.
Alejandro Mayorkas, Secretary of Homeland Security, issued new directives for ICE at the end of September that will take effect on November 29.
Only one person is in the United States illegally should not be "the only basis" to detain and deport them, according to the new protocols.
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Last week our sister network NBC News reported that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS, for its acronym in English), to which CBP belongs, will put into operation a surveillance network in Central and South America of migrant caravans at the end of the month. heading towards the US border.
In September, the government of President Joe Biden was taken by surprise by the arrival of more than 17,000 migrants, mostly Haitians, who congregated under an international bridge in Del Rio, Texas, after crossing the border with Mexico.
The new surveillance unit will provide DHS with "hints and warnings" of possible waves of migrants by collecting data from agency personnel in Central and South America.
The chain added that a DHS planning document indicates the purpose of "establishing aerial surveillance of the trucks and migrant camps that congregate at the borders, and an increase in communication with intelligence and police agencies in other countries." .
