LA County Sheriff Helps Deport Record Numbers of Immigrants

Colorlines
By: Aura Bogado
Published: September 12, 2013
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The work of handing over arrestees to immigration authorities under the controversial Secure Communities, or S-Comm, program is largely done by local county sheriffs. And, in terms of sheer numbers, no county has cooperated more fully than Los Angeles, where undocumented immigrants, authorized residents, and even U.S.-born citizens have been turned over for deportation. In fact, nearly 11 percent of all immigration detainers under S-Comm have originated in Los Angeles County—with Sheriff Lee Baca’s blessing.

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JS Publication February 27, 2009

Local Democracy on ICE: Why State and Local Governments Have No Business in Federal Immigration Law Enforcement

287(g) is a tiny provision in federal immigration law that allows Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to take local police away from their mission of fighting crime, and pull them into the murky territory of targeting immigrants for arrest without suspicion of crime. ICE described the 287(g) program as a public safety measure to target “criminal illegal aliens,” but its largest impact has been on law-abiding immigrant communities. Rather than focusing on serious crime, police resources are spent targeting day-laborers, corn-vendors and people with broken tail-lights. This report details findings from a year-long investigation of 287(g) by Justice Strategies, and recommends that the ICE program be terminated.

People who live in immigrant communities say that 287(g) brings the problem of racial profiling to their neighborhoods. Our analysis shows that 61 percent of jurisdictions that have entered into 287(g) agreements have crime rates that are lower than the national average. Census data show that 87 percent, however, are undergoing an increase in their Latino populations higher than the national average. Read more »