Immigration Enforcement
DHS Has Incorporated Immigration Enforcement Objectives and Is Addressing Future Planning Requirements Gao ID: GAO-05-66 October 8, 2004The former Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) had five interior (non-border-related) immigration enforcement objectives to address federal immigration law violations: identify and remove criminal aliens from the United States; deter and dismantle alien trafficking and smuggling; respond to community reports and complaints about illegal immigration; minimize immigration benefit fraud; and block employers' access to undocumented workers. After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the INS and other federal agencies began merging their law enforcement functions into the U.S. Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) within the Department of Homeland Security. Congress sought information on how the newly formed ICE was addressing legacy INS's immigration enforcement objectives. GAO addressed the following questions: (1) What is the status of ICE's efforts to incorporate legacy INS's interior immigration enforcement objectives? (2) How is ICE developing budget needs, workforce plans, and performance measures for immigration-related objectives?
Though ICE does not have a formal, distinct interior enforcement strategy, all of the objectives contained in the legacy INS interior enforcement strategy have been incorporated within a broader mission aimed at strengthening homeland security through joint customs and immigration investigations. Two ICE offices--the Office of Investigations (OI) and the Office of Detention and Removal Operations (DRO)--have responsibility for addressing these objectives. Through six enforcement units in four operating divisions, OI is primarily responsible for addressing the following legacy INS objectives: deterring, dismantling, and diminishing the smuggling and trafficking of aliens; responding to community complaints about illegal immigration; minimizing immigration benefit fraud; and removing employers' access to undocumented workers. DRO is primarily responsible for identifying and removing criminal aliens, with some assistance from OI. DRO has begun to align its strategic goals with its budget requests and workforce plans in order to determine what resources it needs in fiscal year 2005 and beyond. DRO is also developing performance measures to help identify future workforce plans and budget requests. For example, DRO is measuring the percentage of the fugitive alien population that is apprehended annually to determine whether resource levels are adequate. DRO officials said that until performance measures have been developed for all activities, it will be difficult to determine which efforts are most effective. To develop its budget request and workforce plans for fiscal year 2007 and beyond, OI field offices conducted baseline threat assessments to identify risks--such as the presence of a business that transports biological materials and may employ terrorists--on a regional basis. Related performance measures have been developed, but are not in use, therefore, they will not be used for workforce planning in ICE's fiscal year 2006 budget request. OI's fiscal year 2005 budget request was based on other considerations, such as the need to monitor foreign visa holders. The Department of Homeland Security reviewed a draft of this report and had no official comments.
GAO-05-66, Immigration Enforcement: DHS Has Incorporated Immigration Enforcement Objectives and Is Addressing Future Planning Requirements
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Report to the Chairman, Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security,
and Claims, Committee on the Judiciary, House of Representatives:
United States Government Accountability Office:
GAO:
October 2004:
Immigration Enforcement:
DHS Has Incorporated Immigration Enforcement Objectives and Is
Addressing Future Planning Requirements:
GAO-05-66:
GAO Highlights:
Highlights of GAO-05-66, a report to the Chairman, Subcommittee on
Immigration, Border Security, and Claims, Committee on the Judiciary,
House of Representatives
Why GAO Did This Study:
The former Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) had five
interior (non-border-related) immigration enforcement objectives to
address federal immigration law violations: identify and remove
criminal aliens from the United States; deter and dismantle alien
trafficking and smuggling; respond to community reports and complaints
about illegal immigration; minimize immigration benefit fraud; and
block employers‘ access to undocumented workers. After the terrorist
attacks of September 11, 2001, the INS and other federal agencies began
merging their law enforcement functions into the U.S. Bureau of
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) within the Department of
Homeland Security. The subcommittee sought information on how the newly
formed ICE was addressing legacy INS‘s immigration enforcement
objectives.
GAO addressed the following questions: (1) What is the status of ICE‘s
efforts to incorporate legacy INS‘s interior immigration enforcement
objectives? (2) How is ICE developing budget needs, workforce plans,
and performance measures for immigration-related objectives?
What GAO Found:
Though ICE does not have a formal, distinct interior enforcement
strategy, all of the objectives contained in the legacy INS interior
enforcement strategy have been incorporated within a broader mission
aimed at strengthening homeland security through joint customs and
immigration investigations. Two ICE offices”the Office of
Investigations (OI) and the Office of Detention and Removal Operations
(DRO)”have responsibility for addressing these objectives. Through six
enforcement units in four operating divisions, OI is primarily
responsible for addressing the following legacy INS objectives:
deterring, dismantling, and diminishing the smuggling and trafficking
of aliens; responding to community complaints about illegal
immigration; minimizing immigration benefit fraud; and removing
employers‘ access to undocumented workers. DRO is primarily responsible
for identifying and removing criminal aliens, with some assistance from
OI.
DRO has begun to align its strategic goals with its budget requests
and workforce plans in order to determine what resources it needs in
fiscal year 2005 and beyond. DRO is also developing performance
measures to help identify future workforce plans and budget requests.
For example, DRO is measuring the percentage of the fugitive alien
population that is apprehended annually to determine whether resource
levels are adequate. DRO officials said that until performance measures
have been developed for all activities, it will be difficult to
determine which efforts are most effective. To develop its budget
request and workforce plans for fiscal year 2007 and beyond, OI field
offices conducted baseline threat assessments to identify risks”such
as the presence of a business that transports biological materials and
may employ terrorists”on a regional basis. Related performance measures
have been developed, but are not in use, therefore, they will not be
used for workforce planning in ICE‘s fiscal year 2006 budget request.
OI‘s fiscal year 2005 budget request was based on other considerations,
such as the need to monitor foreign visa holders.
The Department of Homeland Security reviewed a draft of this report and
had no official comments.
ICE Organization in the Department of Homeland Security:
[See PDF for image]
[End of figure]
What GAO Recommends:
www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-05-66.
To view the full product, including the scope and methodology, click on
the link above. For more information, contact Rich Stana at (202) 512-
8816 or stanar@gao.gov.
[End of Section]
Contents:
Letter:
Results in Brief:
Background:
ICE Has Incorporated All Legacy INS Interior Enforcement Objectives:
ICE Immigration-Related Units Are Beginning to Align Budget and
Workforce Plans with Related Performance Measures:
Concluding Observations:
Agency Comments:
Table:
Table 1: Legacy INS Interior Enforcement Strategy and Objectives:
Figures:
Figure 1: DHS/ICE Organization Chart:
Figure 2: Transition of the Legacy INS Interior Enforcement Strategy
Objectives into ICE:
Figure 3: ICE OI Workforce Staffing Cycle:
Abbreviations:
BFU: benefit fraud unit:
CBP: Customs and Border Protection:
CIS: (U.S.) Citizenship and Immigration Services:
DHS: Department of Homeland Security:
DRO: (Office of) Detention and Removal Operations:
OI: Office of Investigations:
SAC: special agent in charge:
ICE: Immigration and Customs Enforcement:
INS: Immigration and Naturalization Service:
United States Government Accountability Office:
Washington, DC 20548:
October 8, 2004:
The Honorable John N. Hostettler:
Chairman:
Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security, and Claims:
Committee on the Judiciary:
House of Representatives:
Dear Mr. Chairman:
In January 1999, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS)
formally implemented a strategy to focus resources on law enforcement
activities the agency believed would have the greatest impact on
reducing the size and growth of the illegal alien population in the
United States. INS's interior enforcement strategy--so called because
its enforcement activities focus on the interior of the United States,
not the borders--had five objectives: (1) identify and remove criminal
aliens from the United States and minimize recidivism; (2) deter,
dismantle, and diminish the smuggling and trafficking of aliens; (3)
respond to community reports and complaints about illegal immigration;
(4) minimize immigration benefit fraud and other document abuse; and
(5) block and remove employers' access to undocumented workers.
After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the national debate
on how best to address immigration-related crimes shifted. In
particular, the need to identify and remove from the United States
aliens who pose threats to homeland security--not just those who
violated immigration laws--took on greater urgency. In response, in
March 2003, three federal agencies--INS, the U.S. Customs Service, and
the Federal Protective Service--began merging their law enforcement
functions, expertise, and resources into the U.S. Bureau of Immigration
and Customs Enforcement (ICE) within the newly formed Department of
Homeland Security (DHS).[Footnote 1] ICE's mission, in part, is to move
beyond the immigration-related offenses investigated by legacy INS in
order to more broadly prevent terrorist and criminal activity by
targeting the people, money, and materials that support terrorist-
related organizations and activities. To this end, ICE brings together
approximately 20,000 employees from various agencies in six operational
units.
You expressed interest in learning how ICE has integrated the
objectives of the former INS interior enforcement strategy into its
operations and whether ICE has determined what resources it needs to
enforce federal immigration laws in the context of its broader
objectives. In this report, we address the following questions: (1)
What is the status of ICE's efforts to incorporate legacy INS's
interior enforcement objectives? (2) How is ICE developing budget
needs, workforce plans, and performance measures for immigration-
related objectives?
To determine how the legacy INS immigration objectives have been
incorporated into ICE, we reviewed the DHS Strategic Plan and the
mission descriptions and draft strategic plans that were available for
the offices ICE officials identified as having immigration enforcement
missions. We interviewed ICE directors, deputy assistant division
directors, and unit chiefs about unit missions and strategies related
to immigration enforcement. To determine how ICE is developing budget
and workforce requirements for its immigration-related objectives, we
interviewed relevant ICE officials, reviewed ICE budget submissions,
and reviewed documents related to their case management system and
operating guidance for the various ICE units performing immigration-
related enforcement activities.
We have work under way that will examine in more detail several
interior enforcement objectives, including alien smuggling and related
financial issues, immigration benefit fraud, and preventing employers
from hiring undocumented workers. We will also be reporting on the
transfer of selected legacy INS functions and activities into DHS.
We conducted this review between March and September 2004 in accordance
with generally accepted government auditing standards.
Results in Brief:
Though ICE does not have a formal distinct interior enforcement
strategy, all of the objectives contained in the legacy INS interior
enforcement strategy have been incorporated within a broader mission
aimed at strengthening homeland security through joint customs and
immigration investigations. Two ICE offices--the Office of
Investigations (OI) and the Office of Detention and Removal Operations
(DRO)--now have responsibility for addressing these objectives. Through
six enforcement units in four operating divisions, OI is primarily
responsible for addressing the following legacy INS objectives:
deterring, dismantling, and diminishing the smuggling and trafficking
of aliens; responding to community reports and complaints about illegal
immigration; minimizing immigration benefit fraud; and removing
employers' access to undocumented workers. DRO is primarily responsible
for one objective: identifying and removing criminal aliens, with some
assistance from OI.
DRO has begun to align its strategic goals with its budget requests and
workforce plans in order to determine what resources it needs in fiscal
year 2005 and beyond. For example, DRO's draft strategic plan includes
a goal to use fugitive operations teams to help locate and apprehend
criminal aliens. In its fiscal year 2005 budget request, DRO sought $50
million to augment the fugitive operations teams for this purpose. DRO
is also developing performance measures to help identify future
workforce plans and budget requests. For example, DRO is measuring the
percentage of the fugitive alien population that is apprehended
annually to determine whether resource levels are adequate. DRO's
performance measures will generally be based on six discrete budget
categories within ICE that the House Committee on Appropriations has
proposed creating for detention and removal operations. DRO officials
acknowledged that until performance measures have been developed for
all activities, it will be difficult to determine which efforts are
most effective and where future resources should be allocated. While
DRO will begin to use performance measure data to guide its fiscal year
2006 budget request, officials said these measures will be used more
extensively for fiscal year 2007.
As a first step toward developing budget requests and workforce plans
for fiscal year 2007 and beyond, OI field offices conducted baseline
threat assessments to identify risks--such as the presence of a
business that transports biological materials and which may employ
terrorists--on a regional basis. At the time of our review, ICE
officials were reviewing action plans based on threat assessments
submitted by the field offices. Related performance measures have been
developed to assess how well a particular threat has been addressed.
However, these measures are not in use because OI's director has not
yet approved them. They will not be used for workforce planning in
ICE's fiscal year 2006 budget request. OI's fiscal year 2005 budget
request was not based on threat assessments, but on other
considerations, such as the need to monitor foreign-student visa
holders.
The Department of Homeland Security reviewed a draft of this report and
had no official comments.
Background:
Legacy INS Interior Enforcement Strategy:
Legacy INS's interior enforcement strategy was tied to five objectives,
with resources allocated to these objectives. Table 1 summarizes each
strategy and its objectives.
Table 1: Legacy INS Interior Enforcement Strategy and Objectives:
Interior enforcement strategy (in priority order): 1. Identify and
remove criminal aliens from the United States and minimize their
recidivism;
Scope and objectives: Identify and remove criminal aliens as they come
out of the federal and state prison systems and remove those convicted
of aggravated felonies currently in probation and parole status.
Interior enforcement strategy (in priority order): 2. Deter, dismantle,
and diminish (organizations) smuggling or trafficking in aliens;
Scope and objectives: Disrupt and dismantle the criminal infrastructure
that encouraged and benefited from illegal immigration; begin in source
and transit countries and continue inside the United States, focusing
on smugglers, counterfeit document producers, transporters, and
employers who exploit and benefit from illegal immigration.
Interior enforcement strategy (in priority order): 3. Respond to
community reports and complaints about illegal immigration;
Scope and objectives: Respond to local law enforcement issues and
needs, with emphasis on working with local communities to identify and
address problems that arise from the impact of illegal immigration,
based on local threat assessments.
Interior enforcement strategy (in priority order): 4. Minimize
immigration benefit fraud and other document abuse;
Scope and objectives: Investigate and prosecute benefit fraud and
document abuse, such as use of fraudulent marriage licenses, to promote
integrity of the legal immigration system.
Interior enforcement strategy (in priority order): 5. Block and remove
employers' access to undocumented workers;
Scope and objectives: Deny employers access to unauthorized workers by
checking their compliance with the employment verification requirements
in the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986. This was to be
coupled with efforts to control smuggling activity.
Source: GAO.
[End of table]
In 2003, we testified that on the basis of our previous work, INS faced
numerous challenges to implementing its interior enforcement
strategy.[Footnote 2] For example, the potential pool of aliens that
had committed crimes that made them removable from the United States
(termed criminal aliens) and fugitives (those aliens not in compliance
with immigration status, orders, or laws) was in the hundreds of
thousands. The number of individuals smuggled into the United States
had increased dramatically, and alien smuggling had become more
sophisticated, complex, organized, and flexible. Tens of thousands of
aliens annually illegally seek immigration benefits, such as work
authorization and change of visa status (e.g., from student to
nonstudent), and some of these aliens use these benefits to enable them
to conduct criminal activities. Hundreds of thousands of aliens
unauthorized to work in the United States used fraudulent documents to
circumvent the process designed to prevent employers from hiring them.
In many instances, employers have been complicit in this activity. By
assuming responsibility for the former INS strategy, ICE will face
these same challenges.
We also testified that fundamental management challenges existed in
several of the interior enforcement programs and that addressing them
would require the high-level attention and concerted efforts of
ICE.[Footnote 3] For example, INS lacked reliable data to determine
staff needs, clear and consistent guidelines and procedures for
working-level staff, and appropriate performance measures to help
assess program results. We stated that as ICE assumed responsibility
for strategy implementation, ICE should consider how to address these
challenges by improving resource allocation, program guidance, and
performance measurement.
ICE Mission and Organization:
Generally, ICE's mission is intended to reflect DHS's 2004 Strategic
Plan, which states that immigration enforcement should be viewed as
part of a comprehensive homeland security strategy that unifies and
coordinates law enforcement operations across formerly separate
agencies, such as Customs and INS. ICE is now the second largest
investigative bureau in the federal government, with approximately
20,000 people. ICE's Office of Investigations is responsible for
enforcing immigration and customs laws. OI has about 6,000 agents in 27
field offices (headed by a special agent in charge, or SAC) throughout
the United States. ICE's Office of Detention and Removal Operations is
responsible for processing, detaining, and removing aliens illegally in
the United States. DRO has 21 field offices throughout the United
States and it operates eight secure detention facilities known as
service processing centers and augments these centers with seven
contract detention facilities. Figure 1 shows how ICE fits within the
DHS organization.
Figure 1: DHS/ICE Organization Chart:
[See PDF for image]
[End of figure]
ICE Has Incorporated All Legacy INS Interior Enforcement Objectives:
Field office staff of two ICE offices, OI and DRO, have incorporated
the five legacy INS interior enforcement objectives. While ICE
officials told us that a formal distinct interior enforcement strategy
no longer exists, OI has established enforcement units within divisions
that primarily address four of the objectives:
* The legacy INS objective of deterring, dismantling, and diminishing
smuggling or trafficking in aliens is now addressed by the human
trafficking unit in the Smuggling and Public Safety Investigations
Division.
* The legacy INS objective of responding to community reports and
complaints about illegal immigration is now addressed by two OI units:
human trafficking and human rights within the Smuggling and Public
Safety Investigations Division.
* The legacy INS objective of minimizing immigration benefit fraud and
other document abuse (e.g., fraudulent marriage licenses) is now
addressed by the identity and benefits fraud unit in the Smuggling and
Public Safety Investigations Division, and the visa security unit in
the International Affairs Division.
* The legacy INS objective of blocking and removing employers' access
to undocumented workers--particularly with respect to the nation's
critical infrastructure, including airports, military installations,
and defense contractors--is now addressed by the critical
infrastructure protection unit in the National Security Investigations
Division.
In addition, an OI official said they are pursuing money laundering
charges through the Financial Investigations Division as part of human
trafficking and benefit fraud investigations. This capability did not
exist in the legacy INS.
DRO will be responsible for one legacy INS objective: identifying and
removing criminal aliens and minimizing recidivism. The DRO divisions
responsible for this objective include criminal alien and compliance
enforcement. OI also has a role here. Its compliance enforcement unit
within the National Security Investigations Division identifies certain
aliens who are deemed a risk to national security. Figure 2 depicts
where the five INS interior enforcement strategy objectives have been
incorporated within ICE. Note that the figure does not show all ICE
offices, divisions, or units that perform immigration-related work.
Only those discussed in the report are shown.
Figure 2: Transition of the Legacy INS Interior Enforcement Strategy
Objectives into ICE:
[See PDF for image]
[End of figure]
The following discusses how OI and then DRO are addressing, or plan to
address, each of the objectives in the legacy INS's interior
enforcement strategy.
Deterring, Dismantling, and Diminishing Smuggling or Trafficking in
Aliens:
In 2000, we reported that INS's ability to implement its antismuggling
strategy was impeded by several factors.[Footnote 4] Under INS, two
separate enforcement entities, the Border Patrol and the Investigations
Program, conducted alien smuggling investigations. We concluded that
due to a lack of program coordination in several border areas, there
were multiple anti-smuggling enforcement units that overlapped in their
jurisdictions, operated autonomously, and reported to different INS
officials. According to INS's Investigations Program officials, the
autonomy of the individual anti-smuggling field units and the lack of a
single chain of command were major obstacles to a more effective
antismuggling program.
Within DHS, OI's Smuggling and Public Safety Investigations Division is
primarily responsible for addressing human smuggling through its human
trafficking unit. Some of the program coordination issues we identified
in our prior report may be resolved. For example, according to an OI
official, the Border Patrol will only have a minor role in human
smuggling investigations and will be required to coordinate with OI
before initiating an antismuggling investigation. In addition, ICE
believes that it has instituted a single-chain-of-command structure,
with its 27 SACs reporting directly to OI headquarters.
OI officials said they believe that the merging of INS and legacy
Customs investigators into OI could lead to enhanced alien-smuggling
investigations. For example, OI officials said human smuggling and
trafficking cases in INS would have been handled locally, for the most
part, and the charges pursued would be primarily limited to immigration
violations. INS needed to seek outside assistance if it wished to
pursue additional charges, such as money laundering. With the merger of
legacy Customs and the ensuing ability to investigate financial
violations such as money laundering, additional charges can be pursued
without the need for outside assistance. We have ongoing work reviewing
ICE efforts to address alien smuggling, including the pursuit of
associated financial issues.
Responding to community reports and complaints about illegal
immigration:
OI officials told us that they have both ongoing and planned efforts to
respond to community complaints about illegal immigration through two
units in the Smuggling and Public Safety Division: human rights and
human trafficking. According to ICE officials, operation ICE Storm is
an example of how ICE has responded to community complaints arising
from illegal immigration. ICE Storm is an ICE-directed task force
formed in Phoenix, Arizona, created in response to a surge in violent
crime in the Phoenix area related to alien smuggling. ICE Storm is a
joint federal, state, and local effort to identify and then dismantle
the financial infrastructure of these smuggling operations by seizing
the assets used to transport or house the illegal aliens, or the
financial proceeds generated by these crimes. The ICE Storm task force
included all six ICE offices working in various capacities (see fig.
1); the U.S., state, and county attorney's offices; the Justice
Department's Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives; the
Arizona Department of Public Safety; and the local police department
and sheriff's office. In congressional testimony in May 2004, ICE
stated that the Phoenix Police Department credited ICE Storm with a 17
percent decline in homicides and an 82 percent decline in migrant-
related kidnappings in the final 3 months of 2003. In addition, OI has
established a human rights unit responsible for public safety and
transnational crimes that OI officials say will, among other things,
address gang activities in communities and target gang members who are
criminal aliens.
Minimizing immigration benefit fraud and other document abuse:
In 2002, we reported that immigration benefit fraud--the practice of
obtaining permission to enter, stay, or work in the United States
through fraudulent means, such as false representation of marriage--and
other types of document abuse, such as counterfeiting birth
certificates or other documents, posed a serious problem that
threatened the integrity of the legal immigration system.[Footnote 5]
Some INS officials believed that some aliens were using the benefit
application process to enable them to carry out illegal activities,
such as crimes of violence, narcotics trafficking, and terrorism.
Although this was a serious problem, INS did not have a comprehensive
plan for coordinating its benefit fraud investigations and had not
established guidance for opening and prioritizing investigations. With
the creation of DHS, two separate organizations are now responsible for
combating immigration benefit fraud: The U.S. Citizenship and
Immigration Services (CIS)--a DHS component outside of ICE--is
responsible for adjudicating immigration benefit applications and for
referring suspected fraudulent applications to OI. OI, for its part, is
then responsible for investigating possible criminal violations related
to persons applying for immigration benefits.
ICE has taken steps to address some of the immigration benefit fraud
problems we identified in our report. For example, ICE has created
benefit fraud units (BFU)--field-based units under the headquarters
identity and benefits fraud unit--that are to work with CIS service
center officials in pursuing acts of suspected document and benefit
fraud. To guide BFU field operations with regard to conducting
immigration benefit fraud investigations, ICE is developing an
immigration benefit fraud strategy. In its instructions to all SACs,
ICE OI said BFUs are to pursue leads based on their urgency, with the
highest priority reserved for those cases that pose an imminent threat
to public safety and national security. BFUs are also expected to
support the SACs in their field investigations of benefit fraud. ICE
and CIS are in the process of developing a memorandum of understanding
that is to describe each organization's roles and responsibilities and
how the organizations will coordinate benefit fraud investigations. We
have ongoing work on how well CIS and ICE are working together to
combat immigration benefit fraud.
To address other types of immigration-related document abuse, ICE
created the visa security unit within ICE's International Affairs
Division. This unit reviews applications for visas to detect travelers
posing a threat to national security as well as fraudulent activities
that may arise in the visa application process.
Blocking and removing employers' access to undocumented workers:
Hundreds of thousands of aliens have used fraudulent documents to
circumvent the process designed to prevent employers from hiring them.
In many instances, employers are complicit in this activity. According
to ICE officials, legacy INS pursued this objective through sanctions
against any employer known or suspected of hiring undocumented workers
and those with ties to human smuggling or suspected of worker
exploitation. Following the events of September 11, 2001, legacy INS
shifted its focus to businesses related to the nation's critical
infrastructure, which include private or government entities such as
airports and nuclear power plants. If these businesses were to be
compromised by terrorists, this would pose a serious threat to domestic
security. In April 2003, we testified that given ICE's limited
resources, it needs to ensure that it targets those industries where
employment of illegal aliens poses the greatest potential risk to
national security.[Footnote 6]
ICE is pursuing this objective, now called critical infrastructure
protection, by concentrating its enforcement resources on those
industries where employment of illegal aliens poses the greatest
potential threat to national security. ICE officials said they are
continuing legacy INS's strategy of focusing particularly on the
employment of undocumented workers at critical infrastructure
facilities such as airports, military installations, defense
contractors, and federal buildings. An example of critical
infrastructure protection is Operation Tarmac, an ongoing national
multiagency initiative focused on screening employees working in secure
areas of U.S. airports. As of April 2004, Operation Tarmac had
investigated almost 200 airports and audited nearly 6,000 businesses.
These investigations resulted in the identification of nearly 5,000
unauthorized workers. ICE said that in addition to identifying and
removing undocumented workers at these types of facilities, its
objective is to work with these industries--and the federal agencies
with oversight responsibility for these industries, such as the Federal
Aviation Administration--to reduce the possibility of undocumented
workers obtaining employment in the future. We have ongoing work
related to ICE's investigations into the hiring practices of employers
and the employment verification process designed to help prevent
employers from hiring undocumented workers.
Identifying and removing criminal aliens and minimizing their
recidivism:
Our prior work found that although INS was to identify and remove
criminal aliens as they came out of federal and state prison systems,
INS had failed to identify all removable imprisoned criminal
aliens.[Footnote 7] As a result, some who were released from prison
were convicted of new felonies--and as such, were recidivists. DRO
continues to face a significant challenge in identifying and removing
criminal aliens and minimizing recidivism--that is, reducing the number
of criminal aliens who are reincarcerated. Many aliens, including
criminal aliens, are released from custody pending a final decision on
their removal from the United States. DRO officials estimate that only
40 percent of aliens released from custody report for their deportation
hearings. DRO also estimated that as of August 2004, there were
approximately 350,000 to 480,000 aliens who had been ordered to leave
the United States, but DRO cannot verify that they have actually
departed--and thus these individuals may still be residing in the
United States as fugitives.
DRO officials said they are taking three steps to address the objective
of ensuring the departure of all removable aliens, in accordance with
DRO's June 2003 draft strategic plan: (1) locate and remove the
criminal aliens whose departure from the country can not be confirmed;
(2) improve identification of criminal aliens as early as possible in
the judicial process, including those already in custody in federal,
state, and local facilities; and (3) more efficiently use DRO's
existing prison bed space for the criminal aliens DRO places in
custody. To carry out the first step of apprehending fugitive aliens
who have received orders to leave the United States but have not done
so, DRO established 16 fugitive operations teams, consisting of about
10 officers per team. DRO has requested funding for 30 more teams in
fiscal year 2005. Officials said DRO is taking steps to address the
second and third steps through a series of pilot projects to identify
efficiency improvements in identifying and removing criminal aliens.
For example, to better ensure criminal aliens are identified, DRO is
exploring the feasibility of identifying individuals at the time of
prosecution rather than while they are in prison. To ensure that aliens
who are not detained while in immigration proceedings do not flee, DRO
is exploring using alternatives to detention such as the use of ankle
bracelets, home visits, and telephone reporting.
OI's compliance enforcement unit also plays a role in identifying
criminal aliens. This unit analyzes data contained in various systems,
such as the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System, which
contains information on international students and exchange visitors,
to identify those who may have violated their terms of entry or who
might otherwise pose a threat to national security.
ICE Immigration-Related Units Are Beginning to Align Budget and
Workforce Plans with Related Performance Measures:
Using fiscal year 2005 as a baseline, DRO has begun to align its
strategic goals for fugitive operations and alien removal efforts,
among others, with its workforce plans and budget requests. In
addition, DRO is developing outcome-based performance measures to help
determine how effectively it is performing its immigration-related
functions overall. These performance measures are based on six discrete
budget categories within ICE that the House Committee on Appropriations
has proposed creating for detention and removal operations. To guide
development of budget and workforce requirements for fiscal year 2007
and beyond, OI is conducting baseline threat assessments through its
regional offices. OI's fiscal year 2005 budget request is based on
other considerations, including a congressional mandate.
DRO Is Developing Performance Measures That It Plans to Tie to
Budgeting, Workforce Planning, and Strategic Goals for Fiscal Year 2005
and Beyond:
DRO has begun to align its strategic goals with its workforce plans and
budget requests in order to determine what resources it needs in fiscal
year 2005 and beyond. For example, DRO's draft strategic plan includes
a goal to use its fugitive operations teams to help locate and
apprehend criminal aliens. DRO currently has 16 fugitive operations
teams. In its fiscal year 2005 budget request, DRO sought $50 million
and 236 positions to staff 30 additional operations teams (bringing the
total to 46 teams). DRO's strategic plan also includes a goal to hire
other new staff (apart from fugitive operations teams) to assist in the
removal of criminal aliens from federal, state, and local correctional
institutions. To this end, DRO sought $30 million in its fiscal year
2005 request. The request, if approved, will enable DRO to hire 249
officers to perform this alien removal work, which is now done by OI.
For future budget submissions, DRO is attempting to measure its
workload in some areas in order to develop workforce plans and related
budget requests. For example, to determine the resources that DRO will
need to identify and remove criminal aliens in the future, DRO has
contracted for a study to determine the current and projected number of
removable aliens incarcerated in state prisons and local jails. DRO
will also use the results of its pilot programs (e.g, electronic
monitoring and home visits of nondetained aliens) to determine which
efforts intended to prevent nondetained aliens from fleeing while in
immigration proceedings, may merit additional funding.
DRO is also developing performance measures, which are needed to help
develop workforce plans and budget requests. For example, in fugitive
operations, DRO is measuring the percentage of the fugitive alien
population that is apprehended annually. DRO is developing its
performance measures based on six discrete budget categories within ICE
that the House Committee on Appropriations has proposed creating for
detention and removal operations.[Footnote 8] The categories pertain to
specific DRO functions in custody management, case management, fugitive
operations, institutional alien removal, alternatives to detention, and
alien transportation and removal. According to the House Committee on
Appropriations report, the purpose of creating these categories is to
improve the way budget information is presented and tracked so as to
bring additional detail and clarity to the budget process. On the basis
of this report, DRO has chosen to align new performance measures with
the categories, using fiscal year 2005 as a baseline. In past testimony
on legacy INS's interior enforcement strategy, we said that INS lacked
management information, such as performance measures, that were needed
to determine how many staff were required to meet program goals and
allocate human capital resources.[Footnote 9]
DRO officials acknowledge that they face challenges as they continue to
develop performance measures. DRO officials indicated, for example,
that until they develop performance measures for all activities--and
then use those measures to assess how well DRO is performing--it will
be difficult to determine which of its efforts are most effective and
where future resources should be allocated. For instance, DRO is not
certain of the relative value of deploying fugitive operation teams in
removing criminal aliens--for which it has performance measures--
compared with other efforts where new performance measures are not yet
fully developed, such as identifying removable aliens earlier in the
judicial process. While DRO will begin to use performance measure data
to guide its fiscal year 2006 budget request, officials said these
measures will be used more extensively for fiscal year 2007.
DRO's ability to project staff needs is also challenged by the
operations of other DHS components involved in immigration enforcement.
DRO's draft strategic plan states, and DRO officials confirm, that they
will need additional information on how ICE and non-ICE immigration
enforcement entities, such as Customs and Border Protection (CBP), plan
to address apprehending illegal aliens. The demand for DRO's services
is in part driven by how CBP, and others, perform. For example, the
demand for DRO bed space in facilities that house criminal aliens is
driven both by CBP's enforcement efforts and OI's success in
investigating cases involving immigration violations. DRO must
integrate the goals of these organizations with regard to their needs
for detention space in order to estimate its staff requirements.
OI Will Develop Budget and Workforce Plans Using Performance Measures
Guided by Threat Assessments:
As a first step toward developing budget requests and workforce plans
for fiscal year 2007 and beyond, OI field offices have conducted
baseline threat-level assessments. According to officials, these threat
assessments will help ICE to identify risks on a regional basis. For
example, an ICE region might contain a business that transports
biological materials. Terrorists may attempt to obtain employment at
such a business in order to obtain such materials. As each field office
completes its threat assessments, which are to be updated on a
recurring basis, an action plan is developed to address the threats.
For instance, OI could use its authority for critical infrastructure
protection--as it has in Operation Tarmac--to develop a plan that
checks the identities of persons who work at a business that transports
biological materials, and help the business establish security
policies. At the time of our review, ICE officials were reviewing
action plans based on threat assessments submitted by the field
offices.
Once a plan for addressing a particular threat is in place, SACs will
measure how well a particular threat has been addressed. Specifically,
they intend to measure the impact of OI's investigative activities on
deterring threats or decreasing vulnerabilities to national security.
An OI official said new performance measures have been developed for
this purpose but are not being used because OI's director has not yet
approved them. These measures will not be used for workforce planning
in ICE's fiscal year 2006 budget request. In accordance with the
Government Performance and Results Act of 1993, OI told us it plans to
base its new performance measures on outcomes, which assess results
relative to goals. These measures will be used in place of traditional
output measures, such as the number of cases initiated, work hours
expended, arrests, and seizures.
OI will use its performance measures to determine whether it should
reallocate its existing staff or request additional staff to better
address the threats identified in the threat-assessment process (see
fig. 3). ICE officials said linking threat assessments with workforce
planning will become part of OI's staffing requirement methodology for
future budget requests.
Figure 3: ICE OI Workforce Staffing Cycle:
[See PDF for image]
[End of figure]
OI's fiscal year 2005 budget request was not based on the threat-
assessment approach because required performance measures had not been
developed. The 2005 budget request was based on estimates of separate
and unrelated needs, such as OI's anticipated workforce levels to carry
out its compliance enforcement mission; and the creation of a visa
security unit to work with the State Department in reviewing visa
applications from other countries, including reviewing all visa
requests from Saudi Arabia as mandated by Congress.[Footnote 10] For
fiscal year 2005, for example, OI seeks an additional $16 million to
add 130 compliance enforcement agents dedicated to monitoring foreign
students and other visitors with visas who may pose a threat to
national security. ICE officials said this request was based on
workload estimates generated by the number of investigative leads
created by the systems used to track aliens visiting the United States
with visas. If funded, this would bring the proposed total to 165
agents in the field offices by the end of fiscal year 2005.
OI also seeks for fiscal year 2005 an additional $23 million to add 200
agents to deter employers from hiring undocumented workers. OI
estimates that with these additional resources it will complete 50
percent more investigations and present 50 percent more employer cases
for prosecution, in fiscal year 2005 than in fiscal year 2004. Priority
in this area will be given to investigation of critical infrastructure
facilities and prosecution of employers suspected of human trafficking
or smuggling offenses, criminal violations, or other forms of worker
exploitation.
Finally, OI officials said there are plans for deploying agents who may
become available if DRO's budget request to assume the institutional
removal program is included in DHS's budget appropriations for DRO for
fiscal year 2005. In that case, OI anticipates using the 249 agents who
would be freed up by this request to pursue criminal aliens on
probation or parole and address alien involvement in street gangs. This
activity is consistent with OI's responsibility for addressing local
concerns about immigration violations and the identification and
removal of criminal aliens.
Concluding Observations:
Since September 11, 2001, the federal government has engaged in
sweeping efforts to strengthen and enhance our nation's capacity to
identify, assess, and respond to potential terrorist and terrorist-
related organizations that threaten homeland security. In the 19 months
since ICE was formed within DHS, ICE has begun to develop an
organizational structure designed, among other things, to prevent
terrorist activities tied to immigration violations and to remove
criminal aliens who pose a threat to the United States. ICE is moving
in the right direction by developing outcome-based performance measures
and threat assessments for determining future budget and staffing
requirements. If successful, this approach should help ICE measure its
effectiveness in achieving its immigration-related goals and objectives
and better ensure that limited resources are used effectively.
Agency Comments:
The Department of Homeland Security reviewed a draft of this report and
had no official comments.
As agreed with your office, unless you announce its contents earlier,
we plan no further distribution of the report until 30 days after its
issue date. At that time, we will send copies to the Secretary of
Homeland Security and appropriate congressional committees. We will
also make copies available to others upon request. In addition, the
report will be available at no charge on GAO's Web site at http://
www.gao.gov.
If you or your staff have any questions regarding this report, please
contact Michael Dino at (213) 830-1150 or me at (202) 512-8777. Other
individuals who made key contributions to this report are Amy
Bernstein, Anthony DeFrank, Kathleen Ebert, Ann H. Finley, and Carolyn
Ikeda.
Sincerely yours,
Signed by:
Richard M. Stana:
Director, Homeland Security and Justice Issues:
FOOTNOTES
[1] On November 25, 2003, the Federal Air Marshal Service was also
transferred to ICE.
[2] GAO, Homeland Security: Challenges to Implementing the Immigration
Interior Enforcement Strategy, GAO-03-660T (Washington, D.C.: Apr. 10,
2003).
[3] GAO-03-660T.
[4] GAO, Alien Smuggling: Management and Operational Improvements
Needed to Address Growing Problem, GAO/GGD-00-103 (Washington, D.C.:
May 1, 2000).
[5] GAO, Immigration Benefit Fraud: Focused Approach Is Needed to
Address Problems, GAO-02-66 (Washington, D.C.: Jan. 31, 2002).
[6] GAO, Homeland Security: Challenges to Implementing the Immigration
Interior Enforcement Strategy, GAO-03-660T (Washington, D.C.: Apr. 10,
2003).
[7] GAO, Criminal Aliens: INS' Efforts to Identify and Remove
Imprisoned Aliens Continue to Need Improvement, GAO/T-GGD-99-47
(Washington, D.C.: February 25, 1999).
[8] The six measures DRO is using are based on the funding categories
recommended in the House Report 108-541, accompanying the Department of
Homeland Security Appropriations Bill, 2005, H.R. 4567. The legislation
was passed by the House on June 18, 2004. DRO officials said they are
attempting to realign these six categories into five.
[9] GAO-03-660T.
[10] Section 428 of the Homeland Security Act of 2002 (Pub.L.107-296
(2002)) provides the Secretary of DHS with the authority to establish a
visa security unit. On October 31, 2003, DHS assigned responsibility
for creating this unit to ICE's Office of International Affairs, within
OI.
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