Apprehensions at the southwestern border are at a 17-year low, and the chief of the Border Patrol claimed in a Senate hearing Tuesday that this is due to the actions of the Trump administration.
“The message is out,” Border Patrol chief Ronald Vitiello said. “The executive order calls for the end of catch and release.”
Catch and release was a policy implemented by the Obama administration in which apprehended illegal immigrants would be let go and given a notice to appear in court. The majority of them would not show up for that mandated appearance.
The Border Patrol chief went on to say: “The end of catch and release establishes capacities brought by ICE for detention. So our agents know and people across the board know they when they get apprehended if they require or ask for a deportation hearing they will be kept in custody until that hearing occurs.”
MISSION, TX – JULY 24: U.S. Border Patrol agents look for immigrants crossing the Rio Grande from Mexico (L), to the United States at dusk on July 24, 2014 near Mission, Texas. Tens of thousands of undocumented immigrants, many of them families or unaccompanied minors, have crossed illegally into the United States this year and presented themselves to federal agents, causing a humanitarian crisis on the U.S.-Mexico border. Texas’ Rio Grande Valley has become the epicenter of the latest immigrant crisis, as more immigrants, especially Central Americans, cross illegally from Mexico into that sector than any other stretch of the America’s 1,933 mile border with Mexico. (Photo by John Moore/Getty Images)
Government figures show that apprehensions at the border have plummeted 75 percent between October and April. These stats are viewed as the clearest way to determine how many immigrants are illegally crossing into the U.S. The Trump administration has yet to build a border wall, but it has rolled back Obama-era rules restricting immigration enforcement.
Vitiello added that his agents interview people they apprehend and find that there are “pull factors” bringing them to the U.S., mainly thinking they can get across the border and “be successful and not get caught or get caught and released.”
“If there is a consequence applied to an activity you get less of that activity,” Vitiello said.