It’s a cross between Miranda rights and a Get Out of Jail Free card. The Associated Press reports that “the Obama administration has ordered immigration agents to ask immigrants they encounter living in the country illegally whether they might qualify under President Barack Obama’s plans to avoid deporting them.” The agents have also been ordered to look at arrest files to see if any illegal immigrants in jail would be eligible for release under Obama’s immigration executive fiat.
Rather than putting immigrants in charge of proving their qualifications for staying in the United States, the new rules put the onus on the border patrol to justify hauling in suspects who have breached our sovereign borders.
The training materials apply to agents for Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. They instruct agents “to immediately begin identifying persons in their custody, as well as newly encountered persons” who may be eligible for protection from deportation
[…]
A spokesman for Customs and Border Protection, Carlos Diaz, said immigrants caught crossing the border illegally remain a top priority for the agency. The training documents for border agents, he said, “provide clear guidance on immigration enforcement operations so that both time and resources are allocated appropriately.”
Crystal Williams, executive director for the American Immigration Lawyers Association in Washington, said the training will help filter people the government said should not be a priority anyway. She said the training marked the first she has heard of officers being directed to screen immigrants for potential leniency before they were arrested.
“Just because it’s a change doesn’t mean it’s anything particularly radical,” Williams said.
That’s not what the ICE agents think. According to former deputy assistant DOJ attorney general John Malcolm:
“Agents are being discouraged away from anything other than a cursory view” of an immigrant’s status and qualification for leniency, said Malcolm, who works as a senior legal fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation think tank in Washington.
Of course they are being discouraged — it’s part of our President’s vision of “securing the border.”
Cross-posted at The Lid
