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If the federal rules and priorities are the same now as they were in the early 2010s, then why have arrests dipped?

Photo illustration by Natalie Matthews-Ramo. Photos by Thinkstock, Lucy Nicholson/Reuters and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement/Handout via Reuters.

Last month, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement released data showing it had achieved a nearly 40 percent spike in immigration arrests in the first 100 days of the Trump administration. In a press call about the new numbers, ICEs Acting Director Thomas Homan explained that these elevated numbers stemmed from the White Houses decision to reverse a November 2014 Obama policy prioritizing certain criminal aliens and recent border crossers for arrest. These statistics reflect President Trump's commitment to enforce our immigration laws fairly and across the board, Homan said.

The arrest total in Trumps first 100 days41,898represents an increase of more than 10,000 over the same period last year. Its important to note, however, that these numbers dont reach the former administrations immigration arrest levels from prior to November 2014, when ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations agents worked with much the same latitude they have today. During the same 100-day period in 2014, for example, ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations made 54,484 arrests, with that number representing a slight decline from the even higher rates of arrest in 2012 and 2013.

If the federal rules and priorities are the same now as they were in the early 2010s, then why have arrests dipped? Narrowing in on the data at a regional ICE field office level provides a possible answer: The growing sanctuary city movement may be affecting ICEs ability to get back to its previous arrest capacity.

Several regions where sanctuary policies are prevalent, including those overseen by ICEs Los Angeles and New York field offices, have not come close to their 2014 arrest levels. By contrast, arrests have exceeded 2014 levels in regions like Dallas and St. Paul, which have large swaths of territory without sanctuary protections. (Note: ICE field office regions extend far beyond the cities they are named after. For example, the St. Paul field office includes Nebraska, South Dakota, and North Dakota.) The maps below show total arrests per field office between Jan. 20 and April 29, 2014 as compared to the same dates in 2017. The larger the bubbles, the more arrests per field office; click on the bubbles to see precise numbers.

Very broadly, sanctuary city policieswhich have been adopted in places like San Francisco (in May 2014), Los Angeles (July 2014), and New York City (November 2014)shield unauthorized immigrants from federal immigration enforcement by ensuring that local authorities do not, for instance, question residents about their immigration status or use local jail systems to funnel arrestees into deportation proceedings. Since 2014, city leaders and sheriffs and police departments in the above citiesand others began honoring far fewer ICE detainer requeststhat is, requests to hold unauthorized immigrants past their release dates to give ICE the opportunity to pick them up from local jails. Between Jan. 20 and April 29, 2014, ICE agents in the Los Angeles field office made 6,209 arrests; during the same period this year, they made 2,273. In that same 2014 time period, ICE agents in San Francisco and New York made 2,870 and 1,458 arrests respectively. They made just 1,976 and 687 arrests respectively between Jan. 20 and April 29, 2017.

Ira Mehlman, spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which advocates for stricter immigration enforcement, argues that we should not expect ICE to immediately reach 2014 arrest rates. It takes time to get back in the groove here, says Mehlman, citing the Trump administrations need to replace Obama-era appointees with new personnel in leadership positions. Jessica Vaughan of the Center for Immigration Studies, a think tank that favors restricting immigration, adds that ICEs dramatic increase in arrests compared to the final two years of the Obama administration is a very good start. Vaughan, however, notes the difficulties that sanctuary cities have caused ICE enforcement agents. In places like California, New York, and Philadelphia ICE was no longer able to arrest criminal aliens while they were in local custody, so they had to go out and find them in the community, she explains via email. Some sanctuary jurisdictions have recently reversed their policies, but it will take some time for the administration to implement new policies to address that problem.

In discussing the new arrest spike last month, Homan acknowledged the logistical difficulties that sanctuary cities pose to ICE agents. To arrest people at-large rather than in the county jail, it takes longer, it takes more resources, it's less efficient, said Homan. He later added, If people get released, now theres several people out in the general public, we may not know where they are. So it is gonna take a team of officers to locate that person and do a lot of investigative research on where we can find them.

This pattern of arrest spikes in non-sanctuary cities is not entirely consistent. Some field offices in non-sanctuary-dense regions such as San Antonio and El Paso, Texas, have not reached 2014 arrest levels. There are also a few regions with major sanctuary jurisdictions that have actually seen an increase in arrests. It is difficult to make definitive assertions about the degree of this trend nationwide, given that ICE field offices cover large swaths of territory and the fact that sanctuary city policies differ nationwide. However, of the nine field office zones that have higher arrest rates in 2017 than 2014, just threeBoston, Philadelphia, and St. Paulappear to have more than a handful of sanctuary jurisdictions, as per the Center for Immigration Studies most recent sanctuary cities map. By contrast, of the nine field office zones with the lowest 2017 arrest numbers compared to 2014, four contain six or more sanctuary jurisdictions and twoNew York City and San Diegohave small field office zones that are well-covered by city and county sanctuary policies, respectively.

John Sandweg, the acting director of ICE from 2013 to 2014, cautions that regional variations in ICE arrest numbers could be due to varying institutional capacities across ICE field offices rather than sanctuary policies. The sample size remains relatively small and could be a byproduct of a wide array of operational issues, says Sandweg via email. While Vaughan echoes these caveats, she points out that the dramatic drop in ICE arrests in California suggests that those jurisdictions widespread refusal to cooperate with ICE, especially on detainer requests, is having a significant effect. Its hard to know for sure without more granular statistics, but I think it is notable that the arrests by the California field offices of ICE in particular have gone down so much and been slower to recover, because that state is the biggest and most populous sanctuary jurisdiction in the country, Vaughan says.

Though ICEs arrests of unauthorized immigrants, with or without criminal histories, have still not matched the records set by the Obama administration, immigrants rights advocates contend the Trump regime has returned to immigration enforcement policies that round up people who do not pose any danger to society. The maps below show arrests of unauthorized immigrants without criminal records per field office between Jan. 20 and April 29, 2014 as compared to the same dates in 2017.

2014 ICE Arrests of Immigrants Without Criminal Records:

2017 ICE Arrests of Immigrants Without Criminal Records:

As can be seen in the maps, several ICE field offices, particularly in the South, have hiked their noncriminal alien arrest numbersin a few cases surpassing 2014 levels. Witold J. Walczak, legal director for the ACLU of Pennsylvania, says the large jump in noncriminal arrests, including in the region served by the ICE Philadelphia field office, can be attributed to the agencys new willingness to arrest unauthorized immigrants who are found in the vicinity of planned enforcement actions. They are extremely aggressive now in trying to get into houses, and they question anybody in the area resulting in collateral pick-ups, says Walczak, whose advocacy work is based in southwestern and central Pennsylvania. But weve also seen a good number of raids, either going to worksites, like factories and construction sites, or pulling over work vans. My perception is these are often not targeted operations, just straight up ethnic profiling.

Adrian Smith, a spokesperson for ICEs Philadelphia field office, disputes these claims, saying in an email that ICEs enforcement actions are targeted and lead driven. Asked about his offices large increase in noncriminal unauthorized immigrant arrests, Smith notes that ICE no longer exempts classes or categories of removable aliens from potential enforcement. All of those in violation of immigration laws may be subject to immigration arrest, detention, and if found removable by final order, removal from the United States, says Smith.

Former ICE officials argue that this increase in noncriminal arrests stems from President Trumps reversal of the previous administrations immigration enforcement priorities. ICE has a finite number of resources. During the Obama administration, all of those resources were dedicated to the identification and removal of criminal aliens, says Sandweg. As the new administration directs officers and agents to broaden their focus and places equal priority on noncriminals, resources that were previously dedicated to criminal aliens are expended against people who pose no threat.

Top Comment

If sanctuary cities are "winning", then that's a damn good argument for shutting them down. The government shouldn't be fighting against itself. Either we have open borders or we regulate who gets to stay here. Choose one or the other. More...

ICEs apparent attempts to dial up arrests on unauthorized immigrants regardless of their criminal histories means Americas cities will necessarily be in its crosshairs. According to Pew, 61 percent of the nations estimated 11.1 million unauthorized immigrations live in just 20 major metropolitan areas. The Trump administration has already succeeded in pushing several jurisdictions to reverse sanctuary protections. In February, citing federal funding threats, Floridas MiamiDade County, which includes the city of Miami, reversed a policy limiting cooperation with ICE detainer requests. The same month, the city of Dayton, Ohio, reversed a policy prohibiting police from contacting ICE in cases involving misdemeanor violations and felony-level property crimes.

Whether federal pressure will continue to bring other cities into line with immigration authorities remains to be seen. But without local compliance, ICE will have a significantly tougher time ratcheting its arrest levels up to the levels reached by the Obama administration in the early 2010s.

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Where Trump's Immigration Crackdown Is Failing - Slate Magazine

Yuri Cunza Published 4:07 p.m. CT June 19, 2017 | Updated 11 hours ago

Vice Mayor David Briley and other local lawmakers urged the city Wednesday to adopt two bills that would put into practice some sanctuary city-like policies in Nashville. Ariana Maia Sawyer / USA TODAY NETWORK Tennessee

Yuri Cunza(Photo: Submitted)

Immigration is one of the most urgent problems our country faces today. With a little political will and leadership, it can be solvable.

There are an estimated 11 million undocumented people in the United States, according to the Pew Research Center. These people are living and working in the shadows in fear of deportation or prosecution, instead of contributing to and helping to grow our economy.

Meanwhile, nationally and in our state, businesses across industries like agriculture, construction and technology are suffering critical shortages of workers needed to fill open job positions.

We find ourselves here because, for years, elected officials have not taken the necessary steps to pass immigration reform to keep up with a changing world.

The most recent attempt at reform in 2013 received bipartisan support in the Senate, including support from two great statesmen of Tennessee, U.S. Sen. Bob Corker and U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander, but failed in the House.

Now, the political will to pass immigration reform seems to be changing. In the past several weeks, Republican statesmen like U.S. Sen. John McCain of Arizona and Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina have renewed reform conversations to address the calls from businesses and communities.

The Nashville Area Hispanic Chamber of Commerce believes leaders on both sides of the political aisle can come together and agree on several key elements to achieve meaningful reform.

Immigration reform must secure our borders. This country was built on upholding the rule of law. Allowing an unchecked flow of undocumented immigrants into this country is irresponsible public policy, economically unsustainable and unfair to the immigrants who came here legally.

We must also accept that mass deportation of undocumented immigrants is not a realistic option. It would be economically, politically and morally disastrous to deport millions of people, many of whom have lived here productively and peacefully for years. Amnesty cannot be the solution, either.

Instead, we should provide a pathway for those who are not criminal threats to our society to come out of the shadows and earn their way to a legal status.

Immigration reform should address critical labor shortages that are hurting many American businesses. Some businesses cannot fill open jobs, be productive and stay competitive without tapping into an immigrant workforce. Immigrant workers, hungry to pursue the American Dream, are willing and available to fill many positions.

Our immigration system should help bridge the gap between labor demand and worker supply. Reforming visa programs to provide adequate temporary, revocable worker permits will help immigrants fill job vacancies and businesses be successful.

Although immigration reform can be a divisive issue, we can all agree that failing to uphold the rule of law, creating communities of second-class citizens and compromising the economic prosperity of our nation is not the American Way.

I've spent half of my life in Nashville since my first visit in 1992. Despite floods, economic downturns, and even worse, episodes of immigrant-phobia, our Hispanic community has been and remains vibrant.

I've been a tourist, a foreign student visa applicant, an unskilled factory worker, a cook, and many times, just your average Jos. By 2004, I was serving as Chairman of the NAHCC, an organization I lead today as CEO, representing small businesses to foster economic development opportunities, integration, and sustainable Hispanic business prosperity.

On Sept. 22, 2006, I became a U.S. Citizen. My unexpected journey has shaped me into becoming a leader and a very proud resident of this city. It is a great honor to help highlight Hispanic contributions as community members, workers and consumers.

There is an opportunity to lead on this issue. I urge Corker and Alexander to help broker bipartisan agreement on immigration reform that will benefit our businesses and our communities.

Yuri Cunza is president and CEO of the Nashville Area Hispanic Chamber of Commerce and member of The Partnership for a New American Economy.

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It's time to renew a push for immigration reform - The Tennessean

Today, tech week begins at the White House. The five-day confab will reportedly see the likes of technology experts and big-name CEOs like Microsofts Satya Nadella, Oracles Safra Catz, and Apples Tim Cook.

They plan on covering a host of topics, including the elephant in the room: our fundamentally flawed immigration system. Left unaddressed, the issue poses a growing threat to several sectors including tech. For a course correction, it would behoove summit participants to consider a policy blueprint just put forth by the Committee for Economic Development of The Conference Board.

Here in the United States, family reunification leads the way when it comes to criteria for admittance. It accounts for 65 percent of those admitted. And because the system puts too little of a premium on actual labor force needs, it should come as no surprise that many immigrant workers are underemployed. Combined, growing global competition and seismic U.S. demographic shifts underscore the need for top-tier foreign talent.

Between 2015 and 2030, the U.S. Census Bureau projects that the number of native-born workers who will enter the labor force will barely exceed those who will retire. With net migration expected to account for almost all growth in the U.S. labor force, those immigrants must be carefully chosen to ensure that they will help employers fill key areas of need. And there will be great need, including in the technology industry.

A 2016 Conference Board analysis points to the STEM occupations as one of three fields that look certain to experience acute labor shortages over the next decade. Positions in short supply but in great demand include information security analysts and data scientists.

But despite the looming STEM shortages, our temporary employment-based admissions process under the H-1B visa category shows no signs of receiving a needed overhaul. The tech titans who plan on meeting with the administration should highlight that current policy dictates that all qualified applicants go into a lottery. That is regardless of whether they are trained in a high labor shortage risk occupation like data science, or one with lower future shortage risks.

Moreover, country caps limit permanent employment-based admissions to 50,000 per year per country, regardless of the available pool of highly qualified workers from any given country. That unnecessarily constrains the ability of firms to seek out the best and the brightest from China and India, since they routinely surpass these limits despite having a robust pool of tech talent.

Some other countries have jumped ahead of the U.S. in figuring out how to make their immigration policies best serve their economic needs. In Canada, more than half of their new immigrants between 2009 and 2013 were admitted as part of employment or economic-based programs. Another benefit, the country grants immigrants admission based on their own merits and skills even prior to having a job offer in hand.

This expands options for both employee and employer, which leads to better matching and better economic outcomes. Canada also hands some control over immigration policy to lower-level jurisdictions to better steer immigrants to the provinces and territories, where their skills and work experience are in greatest demand.

The United States has moved at a snails pace when it comes to following similar directions with immigration policy. As other countries adopt strategies superior to ours in attracting high-skilled foreign individuals to live and work in their countries, the U.S. risks losing its position of prominence at the top of the global economy.

Immigration reform has vexed Washington for three decades, and we recognize that fundamental reforms on the scale we envision wont come overnight. Still, with today marking the start of tech week and some keystone industry figures at the table, we feel the time is ripe to change the discussion around immigration.

If they lend their expertise and leverage their bully pulpits, getting just a few reforms over the goal line will go a long way toward creating a more inclusive and dynamic economy. One that will benefit both native-born and foreign-born workers.

Diane Lim is principal economist at The Conference Board, a global business membership and research association working in the public interest.

Brian Schaitkin is senior economist at The Conference Board. Read the Committee for Economic Development of The Conference Boards new immigration report here.

The views expressed by contributors are their own and are not the views of The Hill.

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We can turbocharge our technology industry with immigration reform ... - The Hill (blog)

Cmon, nobody believes this. Next theyll be telling us Trump wants to preserve Obamas executive amnesty for DREAMers.

Maybe he meant to say no way to comprehensive immigration reform but was discombobulated because, for once, he wasnt even close to being the richest guy in the room.

Habermans right that this isnt the first time Trumps been accused of talking up comprehensive reform. In early February, just a few weeks after taking office, he met with a bipartisan group of senators. Joe Manchin reportedly asked him if hed consider a Gang-of-Eight style comprehensive bill that would trade security improvements for legalization. Sure, Ill take a look at it, Trump is said to have replied, which is no big deal. What was a big deal, sort of, was what he allegedly said when Manchin explained to him the sort of long-term path to citizenship (say, 10-13 years) that he had in mind: That doesnt sound like amnesty to me. Hmmmm.

Theres another private meeting which Habermans forgetting at which Trump supposedly suggested he was open to an immigration deal. That one came at the very end of February, when he sat down for lunch with news anchors on the day of his address to a joint session of Congress.

Trump didnt end up mentioning comprehensive reform in his speech. The White House tried to clean up what hed said to the anchors the next day by claiming that it was some sort of grand psych-out of the fake news media, but that never made sense. Assuming Haberman, whos famously well-sourced, is correct that he mentioned comprehensive reform to Cook, that makes three separate occasions on which hes discussed it. Is the White House actually considering this?

The likeliest explanation that Trump was pandering to a private audience, telling them what he thought they wanted to hear, while possibly not fully understanding exactly what comprehensive reform means. All three meetings I just described involved Democrats or presumptive Democrats, whom Trump would naturally assume to be pro-amnesty. None of the meetings was recorded, giving him plausible deniability about what was said. As such, his instinct may have been to ingratiate himself to the people around him by blowing smoke about a big amnesty deal knowing thered be no way to hold him accountable for what he said afterward. After all, whose word is a Trump fan going to trust, Trumps or Jake Tappers? It may also be that Trump likes the concept of a comprehensive deal itll be big, yuge, the comprehensivest! without grasping exactly what that means in an immigration context beyond a vague idea of compromise despite Manchins attempt to explain it. I sure hope he hasnt been suckered into believing that if the deal only legalizes illegals without granting them citizenship that thats somehow a win for border hawks. Citizenship for newly legalized residents is a fait accompli in time. Steve Bannon and Stephen Miller presumably know that even if Trump doesnt.

But hey, maybe he knows full well what hes saying and really is considering a grand bargain with Democrats on immigration. A path to citizenship for DREAMers in exchange for beefy internal enforcement mechanisms might be a deal worth doing. I doubt Schumer would do it as hed insist on a much broader amnesty, but theres no harm dangling the possibility through private remarks. Just explain to me how it fits with the White Houses dont piss off the base! strategy and its full speed ahead.

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Report: Trump tells tech titans he favors comprehensive immigration reform - Hot Air

Archbishop Jose H. Gomez addresses about 4,000 attendees to a special mass for immigration reform at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles on Sunday. About 400 Orange County residents drove or rode buses to the mass. ///ADDITIONAL INFO : immig.catholics.0722 Shot Date 072113 PHOTO BY ANA VENEGAS Hundreds of Orange County Catholics headed to the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles for a special Mass to pray for immigration reform. About four thousand Catholics filled the cathedral to capacity as Archbiship Jose H. Gomez officiated.

Joey Santos, 12, top right, and Matthew Santos, 7, bottom right, watch Archbishop Jose H. Gomez, at left, bless Ezmelda Gutierrez, of Pasadena, center, following a mass for immigration reform at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles. About 400 Orange County residents attended the mass on Sunday. ///ADDITIONAL INFO : immig.catholics.0722 Shot Date 072113 PHOTO BY ANA VENEGAS Hundreds of Orange County Catholics headed to the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles for a special Mass to pray for immigration reform. About four thousand Catholics filled the cathedral to capacity as Archbiship Jose H. Gomez officiated.

Archbishop Jose H. Gomez meets with attendees following a mass for immigration reform at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles in 2013. (Photo by Ana Venegas, Orange County Register/SCNG)

When it comes to immigration reform, the last refuge, quite simply, might be prayer.

A group of about 15 Catholics from Santiago de Compostela parish, mostly immigrant, will be doing just that over the next three days. Theyll be walking, and praying.

They also hope to raise awareness in the communities they pass through on a 52-mile pilgrimage from their church in Lake Forest to the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in downtown Los Angeles, said Lake Forest resident and parishioner Tom Haas, who will lead the group

Its not a march, its not a protest, he said. We are going to quietly pray that some reasonable immigration reform occurs in this country.

The walk is expected to culminate with Archbishop Jose H. Gomez celebrating the special Mass in Recognition of All Immigrants, at 3:30 p.m. Sunday, June 18, at the cathedral.

Haas said the pilgrims first stop on Friday will be at St. Thomas More Catholic Church in Irvine. Theyll spend Friday night at St. Boniface in Anaheim. St. Marcellinus in the city of Commerce will serve as their rest stop Saturday night.

The Most Rev. David OConnell, Auxiliary Bishop for the San Gabriel Pastoral Region, will join the group for the last leg of their journey Sunday morning, Haas said.

Were hoping more people join us as we walk toward Los Angeles, he said.

The idea for the walk came from Antonio Mendez, a parishioner at the Lake Forest church.

Three years ago I took a busload of parishioners from our church to the Mass in Los Angeles, Haas said. When we came out of the cathedral, I saw (Mendez) and I knew he didnt take the bus.

He learned that Mendez had walked all the way from Lake Forest.

He refused to take the bus back with us because he wanted to walk and pray, Haas said.

The next year, Mendez walked with four others and they spent the nights in public parks. This year, when Gomez heard about the pilgrims, he asked the church to put together a more organized walk, Haas said.

A pilgrimage is a sacrifice made in prayer that hopefully gets the attention of God, he said.

Even though Haas is not Hispanic, he said, most of the others who are walking are.

They are extremely concerned about the current immigration situation, especially about families getting separated, he said. They are worried about the wall that has been promised by President Trump. They are concerned about the possible doubling in number of ICE agents and increase in deportations.

Haas said as a Catholic he respects the borders and the nations law. But when people cross over and make it to this country, it becomes a humanitarian issue, he said.

We cant let them die, Haas said.

Parishioners at St. Marcellinus are eager to pray with the group Saturday evening, said Humberto Ramos, parish life director at the church.

Its wonderful that these pilgrims have taken on the issue of immigration, he said, adding that the Archdiocese started holding the Mass six years ago to not just pray for immigration reform, but also to recognize immigrants contributions.

We are all united in prayer, Ramos said. And thats a powerful thing.

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Catholic pilgrims undertake 52-mile walk to pray for immigration reform - OCRegister