A lawsuit has been filed against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) over the surveillance programs it uses to monitor immigrants. The lawsuit demands that ICE disclose how it uses the information it collects.
A group of immigrant rights organizations sued the government for the lack of transparency in the Alternative Detention (ATD) program. This program releases immigrants on bail, wearing ankle monitors while awaiting their hearings, or providing them with a mobile phone from which they must report periodically and through which they receive instructions on what to do during their immigration proceedings. The complaint alleges that this system allows them to be constantly monitored via the GPS on their mobile devices.
The plaintiffs allege that Immigration and Customs Enforcement, an agency of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), does not publish data about the information it collects from immigrants under the ATD and there is no oversight of the agency for the handling of the collected information.
The Alternative to Detention Program consists of a set of laws, regulations, policies, or formal or informal practices that allow the government to release people—or not detain them—for reasons related to their immigration status in the United States.
The lawsuit was filed by the following pro-migrant organizations: Mijente Support Committee, Just Futures Law, and Community Justice Exchange. They are suing ICE to obtain information about the data the federal agency collects on immigrants who were previously processed and then released under the Alternative to Detention Program.
They resorted to this legal action because, in September of last year, the group filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with a series of questions related to the ATD program, and to this day, they have not received a response. For this reason, they filed the lawsuit to obtain transparency regarding ATD information held by the federal government. The main objective of the lawsuit is to find out what ATD does, what information it has, and how ICE stores and uses all the collected information.
ICE says that in the ATD program, run by the Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) Unit, it uses technology and case management protocols to “monitor compliance” of non-citizens (undocumented immigrants) with final removal orders or conditional release while their immigration cases are pending.
However, it's not just about data and information; the lawsuit aims to go further and clearly demonstrate what's happening with this project. Some of the concerns expressed by the plaintiffs include: "The lack of transparency from the government regarding the program," Jacinta Gonzalez, lead campaign director for Mijente, told Univision News. Speaking to the Daily News, the activist also said that "ICE has aggressively expanded its electronic incarceration program in recent years, largely without oversight or public debate.".
According to ICE data, enrollment in the ATD program has increased over the years. In January, there were more than 182,600 people enrolled in the program, 60,000 more than during the previous six months.
In February, ICE said it was preparing a pilot plan to extend ATD with the aim of favoring foreigners seeking asylum, a legal benefit available, who do not pose a risk to public or national security.
ATD's growth plan emerged shortly after a record backlog of cases in the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) was revealed in January, reaching 1.6 million, according to a report by the Transactional Records Access and Information Center (TRAC) at Syracuse University in New York. The backlog currently exceeds 1.7 million.
The government says the program's objective is to reduce the number of foreigners in detention centers run by both U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and in doing so, fulfill one of the president's campaign promises to end profiting from immigrants in detention centers run by private companies.
However, the plaintiffs question the government's stated intention to profit. "The data shows that ATDs have increased, as has the amount of money involved and the number of people placed under surveillance," says González.
In turn, ICE's surveillance program is run by BI Inc., a subsidiary of GEO Group, the company that operates most of ICE's detention centers in the country. GEO Group monitors more than 200,000 migrants using electronic ankle bracelets, at least 26,000 using a voice recognition system, and approximately 26,000 foreigners using facial recognition technology known as Smartlink, according to agency data.
The plaintiffs allege that there is insufficient data to know what BI does with the data of the thousands of non-citizens placed in the program, and that is why the lawsuit is being filed, so that there is transparency, because people should know what information the government has in its hands, and what it does with it; furthermore, it prevents profiting from the data and finally ensures that the information can only be used for the purposes for which it was collected.
News report based on information from: Univision News