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The Department of Homeland Security is being forced to become a lot more transparent about border activity, particularly how many illegal immigrants it is catching and releasing and why it is having trouble keeping so many of them in detention.
Congress ordered the data in language tucked inside the massive spending package it cleared two weeks ago. As part of their orders, lawmakers insisted that Homeland Security make it public.
Among the data required to be posted are how many detention beds the department pays for each month and how many it is actually filling. The department also must reveal the total number of migrants caught and released under Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’ “parole” powers, the reason for each parole, the number of migrants caught and released under other authorities, and the number of illegal immigrants referred by agents and officers to the Justice Department for criminal prosecution.
Homeland Security also is required to report to Congress every quarter on “gotaways,” the migrants thought to be sneaking into the U.S. without getting caught at the border and to deliver another report on what happens with suspected terrorists caught at the border.
“Transparency on the whole has been one of our big initiatives,” said one staffer involved with the provisions. “We think the American people should be able to see what’s happening on the border.”
Those who study immigration issues say the data is long overdue.
“If we want to have an honest debate about immigration, this is the kind of essential information we have to have,” said Matt O’Brien, a former immigration judge who now serves as research director at the Immigration Reform Law Institute.
The law also orders Homeland Security to finally comply with a statute on the books since 1996 that requires a report estimating how much detention capacity would be needed to house every unauthorized migrant who is supposed to be held under existing law.
That report is supposed to be made public.
The law requires Homeland Security to report on what happens with illegal immigrants released on what is known as alternatives to detention — GPS monitors or phone check-in requirements — and how often those people violate the conditions of their release.
That information is supposed to be provided to Congress.
The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a request for comment for this report.
The catch-and-release data will be particularly welcome by those wondering about activity at the border.
Although Customs and Border Protection reports monthly on who has been caught, far less is known about what happens to them afterward.
The numbers could be shocking.
Mr. Mayorkas said in January that the rate of release was higher than 85%. For December, when Border Patrol agents nabbed nearly 250,000 migrants at the southern border, that would mean at least 212,000 of them were released.
Mr. O’Brien said Homeland Security has become less transparent in some key areas under Mr. Mayorkas. He recently completed a report looking at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s withholding of names of people it has arrested.
ICE press releases have withheld names of migrant targets in a third of all cases, compared with just 3% of cases during the Trump administration.
Mr. O’Brien, who used to work at ICE, said the agency’s new reluctance to share information is deliberate and nefarious.
“This administration has said it’s the most transparent administration in the history of the United States. It’s a complete fiction,” he said.
CBP also regularly withholds the names of people it has arrested.
CBP has started to release other information about what it sees at the border, including significant details about the total number of migrants encountered and drugs seized.
That also includes information that is embarrassing to the government.
In 2022, under pressure from Congress, CBP began releasing data on the number of migrants caught each month whose identities appear on the terrorism watchlist. CBP also reports on the number of migrants with criminal records or gang ties.
Pressure from Congress has also forced CBP to report on deaths of migrants while in the agency’s custody, though that data is severely delayed. CBP released its 2022 report on March 4.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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