Homeland Security's Strategy: Arrest and Deport


The feds are rounding up "suspected gang members" by the hundreds. More than a thousand "suspected gang members and associates" have been arrested in the last five months.

Under the ICE anti-gang program, local and state police departments have supplied federal immigration and customs agents with the names of thousands of suspected gang members. Federal agents are comparing those lists with federal immigration databases to target members or associates who are in the country illegally or who have committed serious crimes that make them eligible for deportation, officials said.

The Immigration and Customs Enforcement division of Homeland Security began the program in March. Initially targeting one gang, the program "quickly expanded to encompass alleged members of 80 gangs in 25 states, including Latin Kings, Asian Boyz and Jamaican Posse." The government will seek to deport, rather than prosecute, about 90 percent of the arrestees, presumably because ICE can't prove that 90 percent of the "suspected gang members" committed any crimes after entering the country.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff argues that street gangs pose a "severe threat to public safety." Maybe, but other law enforcement agencies are charged with prosecuting street crime. Homeland Security should focus on its central mission: protecting the nation from terrorist attack. This distraction from the agency's mission may mean that Chertoff has lost his focus. Or perhaps distraction is his focus. Arrests and deportation threats make for powerful headlines, and they keep the press from asking why Homeland Security isn't inspecting most of the cargo that enters the country.

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011713.html

Posted: Mon - August 1, 2005 at 12:46 PM          

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