More than 13,000 immigrants convicted of homicide are living outside immigration detention in the U.S., ICE says

More than 13,000 immigrants convicted of homicide — either in the United States or abroad — are living outside of Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention, according to data ICE provided to Congress earlier this week. The immigrants are part of ICE’s “non-detained” docket, meaning the agency has some information on the immigrants and they have pending immigration cases in the U.S., but they are not currently in detention either because they are not prioritized for detention, they are serving time in a jail or prison for their crimes, or because ICE cannot find them, three law enforcement officials said. A spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security said the data sent to Gonzales is being misinterpreted, and goes back four decades, long before the Biden administration. It is not clear when the first migrant of the 13,000 crossed into the U.S. Two law enforcement officials familiar with the data told NBC News many of the migrants on ICE’s non-detained docket, including serious criminals, crossed into the U.S. under previous administrations, including that of former President Donald Trump. A 2016 DHS Inspector General’s report found there were 368,000 criminal immigrants who were not detained by ICE. According to ICE’s fiscal year 2023 budget justification, there were 405,786 convicted criminal immigrants on the non-detained docket as of June 5, 2021, just under five months after Trump left office, indicating many crossed during the Trump administration. As of July of this year, according to the data provided by ICE to Rep. Gonzales, over 435,719 convicted criminal immigrants were on ICE’s non-detained docket. During a campaign stop in Michigan on Friday, Trump used the data to criticize Vice President Kamala Harris for current immigration policies. The 13,099 immigrants convicted of homicide living in the U.S. may have never had contact with ICE, the two law enforcement officials said. In other cases, migrants convicted of crimes may be released by state and local officials after they serve their time without ICE being notified, as is policy in many sanctuary cities. The two law enforcement officials said ICE prioritizes migrants who have been convicted of serious crimes, like homicide, for arrest. There are currently more than 7.5 million immigrants on ICE’s “non-detained” docket, meaning they have pending immigration cases but are not currently in detention. – This Summarize was created by Neural News AI (V1). Source: https://www.nbcnews.com/investigations/13000-immigrants-convicted-homicide-living-freely-us-ice-data-rcna173125