In the wake of a report detailing the hundreds of thousands of foreign nationals with criminal convictions living in the U.S., some Illinois lawmakers are demanding transparency at home.
It comes following a startling admission from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), which reported that 435,000 undocumented migrants with criminal convictions have been released by the agency to cities around the country.
ICE Deputy Director Patrick Lechleitner sent a letter to U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-Texas, saying as of July 21, there were 662,566 noncitizens with criminal histories on the agency’s non-detained docket (NDD), meaning they are not detained while they await immigration proceedings.
“Of those, 435,719 are convicted criminals, and 226,847 have pending criminal charges,” Lechleitner wrote.
State Sen. Chapin Rose, R-Mahomet, said Illinois law prohibits law enforcement from cooperating with U.S. immigration authorities.
“If ICE never knew they were there, which is the law in Illinois, then that person is going to walk right back out the jail door or the Department of Corrections door at the end of their sentence and right back into our local communities, and that’s the problem,” said Rose.
Rose said with everything Gov. Pritzker has done to make Illinois a “homing beacon” for noncitizens, including free health care options, Illinois must be getting its fair share of undocumented criminals and he wants the state to reveal the numbers.
ICE reports that nearly 16,000 noncitizens convicted of sexual assault have been released, and over 56,000 who have been convicted of drug possession were released.
State Sen. Jil Tracy, R-Quincy, said Illinois’ Trust Act is tying the hands of law enforcement.
“We have a large unknown number of noncitizens here with violent criminal convictions, or pending charges, and we can’t do anything about it,” said Tracy.
BY KEVIN BESSLER WITH THE ILLINOIS RADIO NETWORK
