Five Minnesota sheriff’s offices have struck agreements with U.S. Immigration and Customs (ICE) to enter into the agency’s 287g program.
Minnesota’s Cass, Crow Wing, Freeborn, Itasca, and Jackson County sheriff’s offices are involved in the agreements.
The program allows ICE to delegate authority to local law enforcement.
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison’s office claimed that the program may target non-violent migrants.
“While 287g agreements are sometimes touted as a tool for getting violent offenders off the street, studies have shown that large numbers of people detained through 287g-related enforcement have committed only misdemeanors or traffic violations,” an office spokesperson told the Sahan Journal.
The increase in the number of counties joining ICE’s 287g program follows President Trump’s January executive order on protecting Americans from invasion.
“It is the policy of the United States to faithfully execute the immigration laws against all inadmissible and removable aliens, particularly those aliens who threaten the safety or security of the American people. Further, it is the policy of the United States to achieve the total and efficient enforcement of those laws, including through lawful incentives and detention capabilities,” the order said, calling for the Secretary of Homeland Security to “take appropriate action, through agreements under section 287(g)…to authorize State and local law enforcement officials, as the Secretary of Homeland Security determines are qualified and appropriate, to perform the functions of immigration officers in relation to the investigation, apprehension, or detention of aliens in the United States under the direction and the supervision of the Secretary of Homeland Security.”
“Such authorization shall be in addition to, rather than in place of, Federal performance of these duties,” the order read.
