Illegal immigrants already slated for deportation remain for years in the country before they are finally removed, government data shows.
There were more than one million illegal aliens with final orders of removal in the country as of June 2, 2018, according to data obtained through a freedom of information request from the Immigration Reform Law Institute (IRLI), an anti-mass immigration advocacy law firm.
This means even when a person is ordered to be deported, it would still take ICE about four years, on average to actually remove him or her from the United States.
About two thirds of those with final or pending removal orders hail from four countries—El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico.
Influx Escalates
IRLI only obtained data up to June 2 before the latest increase in illegal border crossings, which have nearly doubled in the first five months of fiscal 2019 compared to the same period a year earlier, based on Customs and Border Protection apprehension data.Illegal border crossings are on-pace to reach nearly one million this year. In February alone, 66,000 people crossed the border illegally, according to border patrol. An additional 10,000 were detained after presenting at a port of entry without proper paperwork.
ICE could discourage further influx across the southern border, if it focused resources on clearing the backlog of people slated for deportation, according to former ICE Associate Director in the Obama administration Thomas Homan.
“ICE should do a nationwide operation to locate, arrest, and remove those who have entered the United States illegally, including family units, who have had their due process, lost their cases, and have been ordered removed by a judge,” he said. “If a final order issued by a federal judge doesn’t mean anything and it isn’t executed, then there is no integrity in the entire system.”