The National Border Patrol Council reported on its weekly podcast that Border Patrol agents testified before Congress about being ordered to not only release illegal immigrants who have crossed the border, but to also release illegal aliens who have committed previous crimes in this country.

Representatives from the National Border Patrol Council (NBPC) were, in the words of NBPC spokesman Shawn Moran, “front and center” on border security and immigration issues this week.

The NBPC, the official union of the U.S. Border Patrol, gave an update about the non-enforcement policies on its podcast, “The Green Line.”

As reported by Breitbart Texas’ Bob Price, one of  the reasons for the NBPC podcast is to improve communications to its nearly 17,000 non-supervisory border patrol agents in the union.

During the podcast, Shawn Moran, the spokesperson and vice president of the NBPC union, reported to border patrol agents and other listeners that Agent Dean Mandel of the Buffalo Sector, and NBPC President Brandon Judd, had testified before two different congressional committees this week.

Moran related that NBPC President Judd’s testimony created quite a bit of controversy and shined a light on the issues facing Border Patrol agents.

As it relates to the southwest border, Judd told the U.S. House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration and Border Security that agents are instructed to not place families in detention or put them inline for removal proceedings if ICE (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement) does not have any detention space.

Judd reported that agents are told to just take the illegal immigrant’s basic information and note that they are in the country, and then just let “them walk out the door to their destinations in the United States.” They do not give them a notice to appear at deportation hearings. However, Judd testified that among border agents, these notices are referred to as “notices to disappear.”

After the testimony, Breitbart News reported that the president of the border patrol union testified that the Obama administration has instituted a policy requiring U.S. Border Patrol agents to release illegal immigrants who claim they have been in the U.S. since January 2014.

In January 2015, Breitbart Texas’ Brandon Darby reported that leaked internal training documents from U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) revealed that border patrol agents were receiving guidelines instructing them that the vast majority of illegal immigrants in the U.S. are off limits to federal agents and are substantially immune to detention and deportation. Darby dubbed this problem “Catch and Release 2.0.”

Breitbart News reported that Judd testified this week that only about forty percent of those who illegally cross our nation’s borders are arrested.

As it relates to criminal aliens, those who have committed crimes in the U.S., ICE is not able to initiate removal proceedings unless the criminal alien has a felony conviction. If the criminal alien has a misdemeanor, or there are felony proceedings pending, removal documentation is not processed.

Moreover, if an agent does not physically observe an illegal immigrant illegally crossing the border, agents cannot initiate removal. Moran said the problem is that the “word spreads quickly” that all illegal immigrants must say is they have already been in the country. This is true even if an agent has a good idea they just illegally walked over the border, he said. “What is wrong with this country? You can now claim things but you don’t have to prove it?,” Moran asked.

As it relates to the northern border, Agent Mandel testified before the U.S. Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee that Canada will be screening and accepting 25,000 refugees from the Middle East.

The NBPC’s spokesman said during the podcast that one of the points that was brought up during this committee hearing is that the Visa waiver system in Canada is similar to the system in the U.S. and 51 other countries. As it relates to this situation, Moran said this poses a “huge security gap” because it operates under the assumption, for example, that if you are from France “you pose no security risk.” He said this “assumption of risk” is built-in to the process in spite of the terror cells that are in Europe “and is completely false.”

As reported by Breitbart Texas in November 2015, during a hearing on “Worldwide Threats and Homeland Security Challenges,” Lamar Smith asked FBI Director James B. Comey, U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Jeh Johnson, and Nicholas J. Rasmussen, Director of the National Counterterrorism Center, about the security risk that Syrian refugees pose to Americans and whether the country can properly vet them. The response was that every refugee is interviewed and they fill out an application. Rep. Smith responded summing up what he had heard saying, “You can’t go beyond that, so you are sorta having to take their word for it.” Smith noted that both FBI Director Comey and Homeland Security Secretary Johnson admitted that they do not currently have the ability to properly screen and conduct sufficient background checks on these refugees. In a House Judiciary Committee hearing later the same week, Director Comey admitted that determining which refugees could pose a threat would be “challenging.”

As reported by Bob Price in March of 2015, Breitbart Texas announced its sponsorship of the podcast hosted by the NBPC. Breitbart News co-founder, president and CEO Larry Solov, Breitbart Texas’ Managing Director Brandon Darby, and reporter Ildefonso Ortiz, traveled to Phoenix to meet with border patrol union officials. They were there to help launch this effort and help support the agents who put their lives on the line.

Lana Shadwick is a writer and legal analyst for Breitbart Texas. Follow her on Twitter@LanaShadwick2

(DISCLOSURE: Breitbart Texas sponsored the start of The Green Line, a podcast for the National Border Patrol Council (NBPC) and also donated funds to the National Border Patrol Council to cover the costs of a slain agent’s funeral. Breitbart Texas managing director Brandon Darby previously received an award from NBPC Local 2455 for his efforts on behalf of supporting agents and informing the public on conditions at the U.S.-Mexico border.)

Lana Shadwick is a writer and legal analyst for Breitbart Texas. Follow her on Twitter@LanaShadwick2