Immigrations and Customs Enforcement has suspended its weekly publication of sanctuary cities that don’t comply with detainer requests for criminal illegal immigrants, following complaints about the data’s accuracy.
“ICE remains committed to publishing the most accurate information available regarding declined detainers across the country and continues to analyze and refine its reporting methodologies,” the agency said on its website.
Sheriff’s offices around the nation had complained about the reports’ accuracy, NBC News reported.
For example, Hennepin County, Minn., Sheriff Rich Stanek said the agency had listed two inmates in its first weekly report that were detained by ICE as soon as they were released from the county jail, NBC News reported.
“If a picture is worth a thousand words, this one is worth two thousand,” Stanek said in a statement, NBC News reported. “These two instances demonstrate that the Sheriff’s Office cooperated with ICE to the fullest extent of the law. In fact, we call ICE every time we learn that an inmate of interest to them is being released.”
There was no correction issued by ICE, NBC News reported.
The report’s release was mandated by President Donald Trump in a January executive order aimed to pressure sanctuary jurisdictions by highlighting crimes committed by illegal immigrants; the administration has threatened to withhold some federal grants to jurisdictions that don’t comply.
Under the ICE detainer policy, detainees – generally those accused or convicted of a crime – are expected to be held in custody after they would normally have been released by making bail, not being charged or completing their sentences, for instance.
ICE agents, informed of the presence of criminal aliens in a jurisdiction’s detainment centers, would issue a detainer, asking local authorities to hold the prisoner until their arrival.
“It is much safer for all involved – the community, law enforcement, and even the criminal alien – if ICE officers take custody in the controlled environment of another law enforcement agency,” ICE spokeswoman Sarah Rodriguez told The Hill.
