Controversy Over Secure Communities

By Daniel Denvir

During the five-month period from October 1, 2010 through February 28, 2011, there were 49,983 immigrants who were administratively arrested or booked into Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody through Secure Communities. Of the total, 23 percent were convicted of Level 1 offenses, 38 percent levels 2 and 3 and 39 percent were non-criminals.

Secure Communities has become controversial throughout the country, and a number of localities have asked to withdraw from the program. Earlier this month, Illinois Governor Pat Quinn signed legislation to pull out. Whether not the program is voluntary, however, remains unclear. ICE had previously said that the agreement with states was optional, but now says that it is mandatory.

"Secure Communities is not voluntary and never has been," Ort told Metropolis. "As we have noted before, unfortunately, this was not communicated as clearly as it should have been to state and local jurisdictions by ICE when the program began. We have taken several specific steps to address this issue. Through outreach with local jurisdictions and members of Congress, we have since made the parameters of the program clear to all stakeholders involved."

Liberal members of Congress, including the Hispanic Caucus, have harshly criticized ICE for misleading elected officials and the public. Recently, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has conceded that a communication breakdown had taken place.

"The United States government has determined that a jurisdiction cannot choose to have the fingerprints it submits to the federal government processed only for criminal history checks," says Ort. "Further, jurisdictions cannot demand that the identifications that result from DHS's processing of the fingerprints not be shared with local ICE field offices in that jurisdiction. The local ICE field office, and not the state or local law enforcement agency, determines what immigration enforcement action, if any, is appropriate.  In that sense, a state or local jurisdiction may not 'opt out' of Secure Communities."

The ICE focus on criminals is a shift from previous enforcement efforts.

Under President Bush, ICE focused resources on high-profile workplace immigration raids, such as a July 2008 nation-wide action targeting ABM Industries Inc. that led to the detention of 42 Montgomery County janitors.

President Obama shifted course, to focus on the deportation of the most dangerous criminal aliens. However, ICE's own data calls into question whether it is only serious criminals who are targeted.

Until recently, there's been little public discussion about the Obama initiatives, which puts the President in an awkward political position in the lead up to the 2012 presidential campaign. The right does not give Obama credit for his heightened deportation campaign, while the Latino community is increasingly angry over it.