Because of the Biden administration’s “no processing” immigration policy, which led to the government losing track of at least 150K illegal migrants in the summer of 2021, new excerpts from training videos for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) reveal the difficulties border officials face as a result.
The videos, which were acquired for the first time by Fox News, show border authorities discussing the logistical challenges they face as a result of the release of hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants into the interior of the nation without proper processing.
The videos cover the time period from November 2021 to February 2022. As a result of a lack of resources and an increase in the number of people trying to cross the border after Biden took office, officials began releasing migrants in March 2021 with the instruction to report to the ICE office that is located closest to their intended residence. However, migrants were not given formal charging documents at this time. ICE agents will often utilize charging papers to identify and remove illegal immigrants from the country. These documents demand migrants who enter the United States in violation of the law to appear before a federal immigration court.
In November 2021, the Biden administration initiated a programme known as “Operation Horizon” with the intention of tracking down more than 150,000 freed migrants and mailing them their formal charging paperwork. However, the ICE training films demonstrate that border authorities were limited in their capacity to detect and remove unlawful migrants owing to the lack of identifying information on the migrants themselves. This made it difficult for the border officials to enforce immigration laws.
“Operation Horizon, the background on this… you know over the summer, we had well over 150,000 folks come in,” one ICE official said in the video. “They were issued a piece of paper that said, ‘go find somebody in ICE,’ and that was pretty much it. There was no processing. I know this isn’t something that you guys asked for, and I can assure you that no one in the criminal alien program asked for it either.”
An additional video clip included a slide that provided an overview of Operation Horizon and its significance for border patrol personnel working on the ground.
“Since March 2021, CBP has been releasing noncitizens on prosecutorial discretion or humanitarian parole and directing them to report to the nearest ICE office where they intend to reside,” according to the slide narrator.
“This process does not address the underlying challenges regarding ICE’s congressionally mandated responsibility to locate, arrest and place into removal proceedings those noncitizens who are not in possession of a valid, unexpired entry document. Under Operation Horizon, ICE law enforcement officers will identify, locate and place into removal proceedings those noncitizens who CBP released into the United States after March 15, 2021,” the video said.
“Since day one of his administration, President Biden has purposefully broken down the structure and law enforcement at our nation’s border with Mexico—all while confusing and misleading the nation about this devious, reckless scheme,” Moody told Fox News Digital. “With Title 42 set to end, the administration may blame the mass surge of unvetted migrants on this rule’s remission, but don’t be fooled. They’re playing fast and loose with the lives of Americans to advance an absurd political agenda and the day of reckoning is upon us.”“As our litigation uncovered, this has been this administration’s plan all along. They’ve let in and lost track of hundreds of thousands of inadmissible immigrants, and it is about to get worse. We will continue our litigation efforts to force Biden to follow the law and try to mitigate this national disaster,” the Florida attorney general continued.
