More than 100,000 parents whose children are U.S. citizens were deported over the decade that ended in 2007, a Department of Homeland Security's investigation has found.
The parents were removed from the country on immigration violations or because they had committed crimes. The removals of the 108,434 parents were among the approximately 2.2 million carried out by immigration officials between 1998 and 2007, Homeland Security Inspector General Richard Skinner said in a report made public Friday.
Skinner warned the numbers were incomplete because Immigration and Customs Enforcement doesn't fully document such cases. The agency also does not keep track of how many children each parent has. He recommended immigration officials start collecting more data on removed parents and their children.
In response to the findings, ICE said it was looking into whether it can better track removals of immigrant parents citizens and the age of the immigrant's parents. Its study is due in about two months.
"I am saddened, but not surprised to learn that our government, in its harsh anti-immigrant stance, has split hundreds of thousands of families apart over the past decade," said Rep. Jose Serrano, D-N.Y.
No comments:
Post a Comment