Deportations carried out by U.S. Immigration Customs and Enforcement (ICE) dipped below 3,000 during the month of April amid a continued surge in illegal foot traffic at the U.S.-Mexico border, according to data obtained by the Washington Post.
According to the Post, ICE deported 2,962 immigrants in April, the first time the monthly figure dipped below 3,000 since such records were kept. The April total is a 20 percent decline from March when ICE deported 3,716.
"U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has concentrated its limited law enforcement resources on threats to national security, border security, and public safety," ICE said in a statement to the Post. "This has allowed ICE to focus on the quality of enforcement actions and how they further the security and safety of our communities rather than the simple quantity of arrests and removals."
The slow-rolling of deportations was started when President Joe Biden ordered a deportation moratorium for 100 days, but a federal judge blocked the order in February. Still, the effects of the order have been ongoing.
The reduced number of deportations being carried out are compounded by the lower number of arrests ICE is making, a fact Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich raised last week. Like deportations, arrests—called "book-ins"—have decreased significantly since Biden has been in office. The reduction in number of arrests was found out during the discovery portion of his office's lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security.
"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 told 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," Brnovich said.
As shown in ICE's statement to the Post, the agency claims its "limited law enforcement resources" as the reason for the decrease in deportations and interior arrests, but Brnovich said of the documents given to them so far, no evidence was discovered to corroborate such claims.
