US Politics
Border Patrol to move away from sweeping raids as support for Trump’s mass deportation policy tanks: report
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it’s investigating the financials of Elon Musk’s pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, ‘The A Word’, which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.
Read more
The U.S. Border Patrol is reportedly shifting away from sweeping immigration raids, such as those at Home Depot and other locations, to make operations more tailored to specific individuals, according to a report.
Under senior Border Patrol officer Gregory Bovino, teams will begin focusing their attention on specific targets, including undocumented immigrants convicted of serious crimes, Homeland Security sources told NewsNation.
Since enforcement operations began, the administration claims it is targeting “the worst of the worst,” but government data indicate less than 30 percent of those detained or deported had a criminal conviction.
Instead, the administration has been conducting raids at locations where larger populations of undocumented immigrants live or work. Among those rounded up and deported have been veterans of the U.S. military, the parents of U.S. citizen children, students on visas, and hundreds of thousands of others.
As a result, President Donald Trump’s approval rating on immigration has sunk from 49 percent in April to 38 percent in December, according to an AP-NORC poll.
open image in gallery
Seemingly, to improve public approval of immigration raids, Border Patrol is changing up its tactics.
However, in a statement to The Independent, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security appeared to contradict NewsNation’s report, saying, “We have always been going after the worst of the worst first. There are no operational changes to announce.”
Ongoing sweeping operations, such as “Catahoula Crunch” in New Orleans, are expected to continue, NewsNation reported.
Those sweeping operations, which have been conducted in Chicago, Los Angeles, Charlotte, Washington, D.C., Portland and other cities, have received widespread negative attention for the aggressive tactics Border Patrol, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and other departments have used.
Members of the communities have pushed back on law enforcement, leading to clashes between protesters and immigration enforcement throughout the country.
open image in gallery
A signature pillar of Trump’s agenda is mass deportation. On the campaign trail, he promised to deport undocumented immigrants whom he falsely characterized as “criminals.” In the administration, officials such as Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff and architect of Trump’s immigration deportations, have pressured officials to increase deportation numbers.
It’s under that pressure that enforcement officials have conducted the sweeping operations.