Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich revealed this week that through his office's lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security, documentation given to them through discovery showed Immigration Customs and Enforcement is basically being abolished through new policy measures put forth by the Biden administration.
In a press release sent out on Wednesday, Brnovich said the obtained documents showed due to changes to ICE "book-ins," also known as arrests, because of policy shifts in who would be arrested and deported from the country means they would be down at least 50 percent.
"What the Biden administration is calling 'interim guidance' is really an attempt to undermine and abolish ICE through administrative acts. What the documents we've seen thus far reveal is that there have been nearly 8,000 dangerous individuals...released into our communities," Brnovich said to Townhall.
"Make no mistake about this, this is a shocking disregard for the public safety of every American. It is having a devastating [financial] impact on our country and what the Biden administration is doing, on so many levels, is unconscionable," he added.
An email from Enrique Lucero, the acting executive associate director for Enforcement and Removal Operations at ICE, sent to other top officials on January 27 talked about the decrease in the number of people who would normally be in ICE custody but will no longer be due to the shift in priorities from the Biden administration:
"ERO ran historical data based on the new DHS memo priorities for enforcement to inform decision makers on potential impacts of the interim guidance. The data also compares what PEP would have looked like for reference. LESA should be able to filter data as needed to show weekly or monthly impacts. Rough estimate is book-ins would be reduced by 50% of historical numbers and the vast majority of book-ins would come from CBP transfers."
"An attachment to this email also indicated that the policy could result in the release of convicted felons into communities (those convicted of murder, kidnapping, assault, sexual assault, weapons, and other serious charges)," Brnovich's office stated.
As a result, DHS identified the following individuals who were arrested in Fiscal Year 2020 who would not be eligible for enforcement or removal based upon the new enforcement priorities:
- 3,371 (Assault)
- 4,174 (Dangerous Drugs)
- 85 (Homicide)
- 46 (Kidnapping)
- 225 (Sex Offenses)
- 73 (Sexual Assault), and
- 503 (Weapon Offenses)
According to ICE data, they only had 1,985 book-ins in February, Biden's first full month in office, compared to 5,119 the month before and 6,071 in December 2020. March saw a slight uptick to 2,343 book-ins but still far below the previous months.
Brnovich told Townhall it has fallen to state attorney generals to be the "first line of offense and last line of defense" against Biden's policies because it "seems that in D.C. there's a lot of people that talk and jabber and debate things, but then they don't actually do anything."
Brnovich said the numbers were discovered in the unredacted documents they were given, 170 pages out of 5,000, meaning they have only scratched the surface of what changes the Biden administration has made to immigration enforcement. He also cast doubt whether ICE has "limited resources" they claim to have in order to comply with the new enforcement guidelines because, so far, his office has not found any corroborating documentation.
Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen is also part of Arizona's lawsuit against DHS.
"The Biden Administration has not only opened up our Southern Border but is now actively working to strip ICE of its abilities to keep the interior of our country safe. I am glad to AG Knudsen and his Arizona counterpart are working to keep the American people safe," Rep. Matt Rosendale (R-MT) told Townhall.