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Through a program called Secure Communities launched in 2008, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) teamed up with local law enforcement to keep undocumented immigrant inmates locked up past their release dates. ICE agents would do this by issuing what they called civil detainers—an order to hold an inmate for an extra day or two.
Though meant to catch criminals and high-risk aliens, the directive largely targeted crime victims and non-citizens with only minor infractions. It reportedly made immigrant communities less likely to trust law enforcement, who basically became deputized ICE agents.
More importantly, the initiative violated the Fourth Amendment by allowing ICE to take suspects into federal custody without a warrant.
Just 19 percent of the 8,000 detainers ICE issued in April this year related to a convicted felon, according to Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse. Two-thirds of those targeted had zero criminal convictions whatsoever.
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