More than 13,000 immigrants convicted of homicide, either in the United States or abroad, are living freely in the U.S. outside of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention. This information was provided by ICE to Congress, with the immigrants being part of ICE’s non-detained docket, meaning they have pending immigration cases but are not currently in detention. The data was requested by Republican Congressman Tony Gonzales of Texas and was provided by Acting ICE Director P.J. Lechleitner.
Many of these immigrants crossed into the U.S. under previous administrations, including former President Donald Trump’s. Trump has criticized Vice President Kamala Harris for current immigration policies using this data. The White House has yet to comment on the information, and some immigrants may not have had any contact with ICE. In some cases, the U.S. is not notified of a criminal conviction until after the individual crosses the border.
ICE prioritizes arrested migrants convicted of serious crimes like homicide but limited resources make it difficult to locate and detain all of them. As a result, more than 7.5 million immigrants are on ICE’s non-detained docket. Some local jurisdictions are rethinking their sanctuary policies to cooperate with ICE in light of increased attention on migrant crime. NBC News witnessed ICE agents arresting individuals convicted of murder and attempted murder in Maryland, highlighting the challenges in locating and apprehending convicted criminals living at large.
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