More than 99% of illegal immigrants caught and released a year ago as part of a special border “parole” program are still at large, according to government data that signals how difficult it will be to unwind the millions of migrants who have gained a foothold under President Biden.
These migrants present a critical test case for the Biden administration. A federal judge has demanded unprecedented transparency in the Department of Homeland Security’s handling of 2,572.
All of them were supposed to have reported in by last summer, but data filed with the judge at the one-year mark shows 25 hadn’t checked in with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
ICE, meanwhile, has failed to issue immigration court summonses to 340 others, meaning they are not in deportation proceedings after a year.
ICE said it can confirm the deportation, departure or death of just 14 people, meaning 99.5% of all of the migrants caught and released under this parole program are thought to still be in the U.S. Only one of the migrants was being held at the time ICE reported to the court in late May.
Andrew “Art” Arthur, a former immigration judge, said the migrants epitomize the problems for Mr. Biden’s administration.
SEE ALSO: Illegal immigrant with ties to MS-13 charged in 2023 killing of Maryland mother
“Those 2,572 people are not even just a case study in Biden immigration enforcement. They are the Biosphere 2 of Biden immigration enforcement,” he said.
“It is a high-profile case with a judge that is laser-focused on DHS’s immigration enforcement efforts, and yet they still can’t do what Congress said they are supposed to do,” Mr. Arthur said.
ICE didn’t respond to inquiries for this report.
Judge T. Kent Wetherell II ordered ICE to report on the migrants after the government released them in contradiction to his order last year, halting the Border Patrol’s parole program.
The Homeland Security Department released the migrants without immigration court dates but told them they needed to check in with the department within 60 days to collect a court summons or notice to appear (NTA), officially starting deportation proceedings.
More than 40% of the migrants violated the 60-day check-in, and even more had yet to be served an NTA.
Under Judge Wetherell’s prodding, ICE managed to get more check-ins and serve more NTAs, but the latest filing underscores how much trouble the agency has had tracking down all of them.
Even though more than 300 migrants remain free without an NTA, ICE managed to serve just one new summons over the month preceding the latest report.
One other migrant filed an asylum application with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.
“The individual was not detained, and an NTA was not served,” Marc A. Rapp, a senior ICE official, told Judge Wetherell.
The parole migrants are now part of a total backlog of some 7 million people ICE has in its deportation system.
Some have been ordered removed and are defying those orders, and others are awaiting final court decisions.
In 2018, ICE’s docket stood at 2.6 million. At the end of fiscal 2020, toward the end of the Trump administration, it was 3.3 million.
The growth since then has largely reflected the border chaos under President Biden.
After more than three years in office, Mr. Biden took decisive steps this month with a policy intended to severely limit asylum claims, which have become the loophole illegal immigrants use to win a quick catch-and-release.
Immigration advocates have sued to stop the policy, but it remains in effect.
Homeland Security officials report that Border Patrol apprehensions are down 10%, and they expect that figure to increase as would-be migrants alter their plans.
Even if the border crisis is resolved, unwinding the years of chaos will be a gargantuan challenge.
Like the test group that Judge Wetherell is monitoring, many of the catch-and-release migrants under Mr. Biden were set free under “parole.” That is a special power of the homeland security secretary that is supposed to be exercised only in unusual instances where a major U.S. interest or special humanitarian case is involved.
Experts say Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has used that power in millions of cases and the ouster rates are likely no better than for the test group in Judge Wetherell’s case.
The test group migrants demonstrate the breadth of nationalities arriving at the southern border, representing nearly four dozen countries.
Some 22% were Venezuelan, 17% were Colombian and 14% were Peruvian. Others were from Somalia, Kazakhstan, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan and Ghana.
Among the 25 who have yet to check in are 10 Venezuelans, seven Guatemalans, three Hondurans, two Salvadorans, two Peruvians and one Ecuadorian.
Venezuelans make up more than one-third of the migrants who have yet to be served an NTA. Colombians and Indians rank second and third. Others on the list include Chinese, Georgians, Angolans, Nepalese and Senegalese.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.