More than 30 House Democrats have introduced a resolution saying the U.S. should “reduce automatic removal and detention” for illegal immigrants, and instead restore “proportionality and fairness” for illegal immigrants and their families.
The resolution, led by Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Ariz., said there is “growing bipartisan acknowledgement of the devastating impact that the criminal justice system has on communities of color.”
It added that an immigration system that relies on criminalization of immigrants “compounds that injustice.”
The resolution was introduced just hours before U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced it released 19,723 criminal aliens in 2015, including hundreds who later committed murder, sex crimes and other crimes.
ICE defended those numbers in a Thursday morning hearing by saying those numbers are lower than figures released in the prior two years, and that most of them had to be released under court orders. ICE did acknowledge, however, that many of those releases were discretionary.
Still, Democrats argued that laws criminalizing various actions by illegal immigrants gives judges less leeway to issue more lenient sentences.
“[T]he Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 created the 287(g) program, which deputizes local law enforcement to enforce federal immigration law, threatens the rights of United States citizens and immigrants alike, and contributes to racial profiling in multiple jurisdictions,” the resolution said.
“[T]hese laws created several fast-track removal processes that violate the due process rights of noncitizens, asylum seekers, and other vulnerable populations by expediting their removal without adequate opportunity to contest their case,” it added.
The resolution concluded that Congress should pass legislation that acknowledges immigrants are “deserving of human rights,” and that restores “proportionality and fairness” to the system.
Read the Democratic resolution here:
