Despite\nsome defections, a program to identify and detain criminal aliens is growing\nacross the U.S.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The number of local law-enforcement agencies participating in the 287(g) program<\/a> has increased from 36 when President Donald Trump took office to 142 today. The population covered by cooperating jurisdictions climbed from 22 million to 31 million.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Named\nfor the section of immigration law that governs it, 287(g) allows U.S.\nImmigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to train local law-enforcement\nofficers to begin the deportation process, running fingerprints and doing the\nlegal status and criminal checks to decide whether someone is a deportable\nmigrant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That bothers some people.\nBowing to political pressure from illegal alien advocacy groups, Orange County, Calif., and Harris County (Houston),\nTexas, ditched their 287(g) agreements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Earlier this year, Prince William County, Va., ended its 13-year\ncooperation with ICE. That fruitful collaboration had resulted in the removal\nof a lot of bad actors, from murderers to sex offenders to drunken drivers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Acting ICE chief Matthew Albence told the Washington Times<\/a> that some criminal illegal aliens are now being released in Prince William before ICE can detain them. Others are never fingerprinted, so ICE may not even get the chance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Noting that his\nagency doesn\u2019t have the personnel to monitor the comings and goings at the county\u2019s\njail 24 hours a day, Albence predicted that some of the 700 criminal aliens\npreviously flagged each year in Prince William will end up back on the streets,\ninstead of being deported. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Still, Albence can point to successes elsewhere. Adding a Warrant Service Officer (WSO) component to 287(g), ICE is authorizing more local police to make arrests on behalf of the agency. Some 65 counties, chiefly in Florida<\/a>, have signed up for this program.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In\na notable case last month, Collier County (Fla.) Sheriff\u2019s Office detained\nan illegal alien from Mexico on an outstanding warrant for lewd and lascivious\nmolestation and placed an immigration hold on him. The subject had two pending\ncharges of sex crimes with a minor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n