Advocacy Groups Challenge Local-Federal Enforcement Pacts
A coalition led by Human Rights Watch, the Alliance of Immigrant Survivors, and Americans for Immigrant Justice submitted a statement of record to Congress on July 10 to end the use of 287(g) agreements. The move follows a June congressional authorization of $31 billion for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), a budget that sustains agreements allowing more than 2,000 local law enforcement agencies to act as federal immigration enforcers.
Undermining Safety for Vulnerable Survivors
The coalition warns that turning local police into immigration agents creates a climate of fear that silences survivors of domestic violence and human trafficking. According to the record submitted to Congress, the threat of deportation and family separation keeps victims from reporting crimes.
“When we shut immigrant survivors out of protection systems, we lose critical opportunities to identify and intervene with harm doers early, before patterns of abuse deepen and more people are hurt or worse,” the groups stated in their submission to Congress.
Discrepancies in Enforcement Data
The report challenges the administration’s claim that its operations focus on “the worst of the worst.” Data collected from the start of President Donald Trump’s term through March reveals that 66 percent of those arrested lacked a criminal conviction. Even more striking, 38 percent had neither a criminal conviction nor a pending charge.
Criminalization of Trafficking Victims
Human Rights Watch and the Alliance of Immigrant Survivors have documented cases where police arrested immigrant women reporting domestic violence and promptly transferred them to ICE. Legal counsel also reported two instances where women apprehended during “prostitution” stings were handed over to immigration authorities, despite circumstances suggesting they were victims of human trafficking rather than perpetrators.
Congressional Funding and Stalled Response
The $31 billion ICE funding package explicitly supports the 287(g) program. In their submission, the coalition urges Congress to ensure that these federal funds do not prioritize deportation targets at the cost of community stability and women’s rights.
