Roughly 1,800 border crossers and illegal aliens are expected to be released from Department of Homeland Security (DHS) custody into the interior of the United States this weekend in the El Paso, Texas region.
Executives with the Annunciation House organization in southern El Paso — which houses released border crossers and illegal aliens — told local media that about 600 border crossers and illegal aliens, mostly from Central America, will be released over the next three days.
For months, DHS officials have said privately that the Catch and Release program has been taken to new heights, while ICE union officials declared this week that the program was in “overdrive” under the direction of DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen.
The organization’s executives said they are struggling with how to provide shelter to border crossers and illegal aliens, saying that hundreds are being released into the U.S. every week. Over Friday, Saturday, and Sunday this weekend, about 600 will be released every day for a total of about 1,800 released.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials could not confirm the release, but did provide this statement to Breitbart News:
After decades of inaction by Congress, the government remains severely constrained in its ability to detain and promptly remove families with no legal basis to remain in the U.S. As a result, family units continue to cross the border at high volumes and are likely to continue to do so, as they face no consequence for their actions. [Emphasis added]
The current volume of family units crossing the border combined with limited transportation resources, time restrictions on families in government custody, and finite space at family residential centers have all contributed to the current state of events. ICE is releasing families to NGOs that provide assistance with immediate basic needs such as temporary shelter, food, water, clothing and transportation services; however, many of these organizations are overwhelmed due to the ongoing influx of families at the border. [Emphasis added]
The Flores Settlement Agreement which was intended to address the detention and release of unaccompanied minors, has resulted in over 20 years of litigation regarding its interpretation and scope, and has generated multiple court decisions resulting in expansive judicial interpretations of the original agreement in ways that have severely limited the government’s ability to detain and remove unaccompanied alien children and family units. [Emphasis added]
As DHS has previously noted, the overwhelming majority of border crossers and illegal aliens — about 11 to 22 million — released into the interior of the U.S. are never deported from the country. Even those roughly 1.7 million illegal aliens with deportation orders continue not to be readily deported, as Breitbart News reported.
In an expansive report recently, Breitbart News confirmed that between December 21, 2018 and March 5, DHS released a total of 84,500 border crossers and illegal aliens into the U.S. This release process often entails federal immigration officials busing border crossers into nearby border cities and dropping them off with the promise that they will show up for their immigration and asylum hearings, sometimes years later.
Federal immigration officials expect the Catch and Release program to be supercharged this year as the Trump administration most recently expanded the program and cut back on ICE detention space that would have decreased the number of foreign nationals released from DHS custody.
Current illegal immigration projections predict that aside from the border crossers and illegal aliens who are caught by Border Patrol, then released into the interior of the country, there could be about half a million illegal aliens who successfully cross into the U.S. through the southern border, undetected, this year.
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter at @JxhnBinder.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.