The news about a recent report on Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) courthouse arrests were packed like a sardine can with hyperbole and anti-enforcement propaganda. The only thing missing, naturally, were the facts.<\/p>\n
\u201cICE Courthouse Arrests Up 1700% Since Trump’s Inauguration: Report,\u201d roared the Daily Beast<\/a>.<\/p>\n They followed up in the lead paragraph with a wild assertion that ICE courthouse arrests in New York (a small fact missing from the headline) \u201chave become so sudden and aggressive that bystanders think they have just witnessed a kidnapping.\u201d<\/p>\n The New York Daily News\u2019 lead paragraph<\/a> \u201creported\u201d that the arrests were \u201cforcing immigrant families to endure terrifying episodes that witnesses have mistaken for kidnappings, according to a new report.\u201d<\/p>\n All of the parroted claims are based on findings from a report from the Immigrant Defense Project, an organization that, unlike the media, makes no attempt to hide its anti-immigration enforcement bias.<\/p>\n IDP\u2019s\u00a0 goals<\/a> include ending \u201can immigration system that every year tears hundreds of thousands of immigrants with convictions from their homes, their families, and their communities\u201d and \u201cthe current era of unprecedented mass deportation.\u201d<\/p>\n The IDP says the findings of the 15-page report released on Monday were drawn \u201cfrom hundreds of reports collected by IDP\u2019s staff over the course of 2018.\u201d But there are no names, nor publicly-available information to verify the dates of arrests or whether any nature of force was used, as the report alleges.<\/p>\n And the media simply replays allegations that it later contradicts with statements from court officials.<\/p>\n For example, tacked onto the very end of one report<\/a> is a statement from New York State\u2019s Office of Court Administration (OCA), which oversees all state courts.<\/p>\n According to OCA, ICE implemented a new policy in January in which the agency would limit arrests to criminal proceedings and make the arrests with Judicial warrants.<\/p>\n \u201cAdditionally, as a result of our continued communication with them, they have effectively changed their tactics shying away from making arrests inside court facilities. Arrests inside of courthouses declined by over 50 percent from 2017 to 2018 from 40 to 13 in New York City and 54 to 26 statewide.\u201d<\/p>\n So, arrests inside courthouses have actually decreased in the last year.<\/p>\n