Obama Keeps Promise to Slow Immigrant Deportations
Although President Barack Obama has yet to deliver on his campaign pledge to push through immigration legislation, he has however met his promise to slow down the deportations of immigrants.
As reported by The Associated Press, the Homeland Security Department has, since October, deported the fewest number of immigrants in the country illegally since Obama took office back in 2009.
Before his re-election in 2012 Obama actively took a series of steps to slow down deportations. One of the measures the president took was the creation of a program that would allow some young immigrants to stay and work in the United States illegally for up to two years at a time.
As of right now, the president’s attempts to keep more than 4 million immigrants from deportation by expanding that work protections program to the parents of U.S. citizens and legal permanent residents is being stalled after a federal judge in Texas blocked the program from getting started.
Meanwhile, the lookout for illegal immigrants has refocused and perhaps become more specific.
Jeh Johnson, secretary of Homeland Security, has directed immigration authorities to focus anew on finding and deporting immigrants who might pose a national security or public safety threat, as well as those immigrants who have serious criminal records or who have recently crossed the Mexican border.
On Tuesday, Jeh Johnson explained his position to members of the Senate Judiciary Committee during an oversight hearing, saying, "With the resources we have ... I'm interested in focusing on criminals and recent illegal arrivals at the border."
Johnson stated that just last week the Border Patrol had arrested about 151,800 people that were were attempting to cross the Mexican border illegally; the number of the arrested represents the smallest amount of people caught at the border during the same period over the last four years.
There are approximately 11 million illegal immigrants thought to be living in the United States.
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