Record Year for Deportations

By Zach Coyne

Washington – Nearly 400,000 illegal aliens have been deported in the fiscal year of 2011, The Government announced Tuesday. It has been a record year for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. The numbers released by the government are staggering. Of the 396,906 aliens that have been deported, 55%, or 216,698, have been convicted of felonies or misdemeanors. 1,119 of the deportees have been convicted of homicide. 5,848 have been convicted of sexual offenses. 44,653 have been convicted of drug crimes. 35,927 of the aliens have also been convicted of driving under the influence. The numbers get even more sobering as you read the data for cities near the border. In Houston, Texas, 20,450 illegal aliens were deported. Of 20,450, 74% of those people had been convicted of a felony or a misdemeanor.

The ACLU’s (American Civil Liberties Union) Joanne Lin, member of their legislative counsel, released a statement regarding the record numbers. “These record-breaking deportation numbers come at a time when illegal immigration rates have plummeted, the undocumented population has decreased substantially and violent crime rates are at their lowest levels in 40 years” Lin says “All told, this administration has deported nearly 1.2 million people, leaving a wake of devastation in Latino communities across the nation.” Lin also bashes the deportations as “uncontrolled, unwarranted” spending of tax dollars.

Janet Napolitano, The chief of The Department of Homeland Security, defended the record number of deportations in a speech at a university. “What critics will ignore is that while the overall number of individuals removed will exceed prior years, the composition of that number will have fundamentally changed.” She said, enlightening the crowd on how the deportees are mostly composed of criminals. Obama recently announced he will be suspending 300,000 deportations, for further review. He will however, continue to deport high priory deportations, such as felons.

While the numbers do seem steep, you would be hard pressed to find anybody willing to defend not deporting illegal immigrants convicted with a crime. They put a strain on our resources and tax dollars by filling our jails and hospitals. One last fact, of the 396,906 aliens deported, 66% of them were being deported for the second or third time.