ICE Now Holds 25,000 People in Detention, Monitors 266,000 People Using Electronic Monitoring Technology

Based on the latest data released by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and available on TRAC’s website, the number of immigrants in detention increased steadily over the past several weeks to nearly 25,000 at the start of June.

This could mean that the decline in ICE’s detention numbers which coincided with the pandemic is over, and numbers are headed back up to their pre-pandemic levels. It could also represent a seasonal increase in the number of detainees consistent with the growth of detention at the start of last summer in June and July.

The length of stay in detention also crept upward slightly from 20 days on average to around 25 days on average.

Photo by CHUTTERSNAP on Unsplash

The number of immigrants on ICE’s electronic monitoring program continues to grow and now reaches over 266,000 people. (For an explanation of why I use the phrase “electronic monitoring” and not “Alternatives to Detention, read my previous post here.)

SmartLINK in particular continues to grow by over 1,000 people per day, even as the number of people on GPS ankle monitors is lower than it has been in several years.

In Other News…

DACA—Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals—turns 10 years old on Wednesday. The Migration Policy Institute released a report last week titled “At Its 10th Anniversary, DACA Faces a Tenuous Future Despite Societal Benefits.” Despite broad bipartisan support for a path to citizenship for DACA recipients, no such legislation has been forthcoming.

Two notes from the Twitter-verse. First, last week USCIS said that the agency is “doing everything necessary” to process employment-based immigrant visas after months of criticism online and in court for being slow to process these visas. The fact that the agency responded on Twitter in this way suggests that public criticism is probably getting to USCIS’s leadership.

USCIS @USCIS

USCIS is doing everything necessary to use all available employment-based immigrant visas. We are working to identify adjustment of status applications with available immigrant visas that lack a valid Form I-693 (immigration medical examination form).

June 10th 2022

51 Retweets389 Likes

Second, in some good news, one of my favorite dudes that I still haven’t met in person, Matthew Archambeau, shared a success story from immigration court. (See? People will share good news when they have it.)

I'mNotTalking @MattArchambeau1

I just had the most amazing experience in immigration court today. The IJ granted asylum to a very nice lady and DHS did not oppose, in fact, they had stipulated. I will not get into the details but this was a very generous act by the DHS attorney and the IJ. I am thrilled.

June 9th 2022

5 Retweets133 Likes

One final semi-personal note. The American Immigration Lawyers Association is in New York City this week. I’m not an attorney so I will not be attending the conference formally. However, I will be in the City on Friday and Saturday to meet up in person with people who are at the conference and whom I only know by Zoom, email, or Twitter. I’m really looking forward to this.

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