According to a new order by Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents (ICE) will have to stop mass raids in workplaces where undocumented immigrants are employed.
Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in a memorandum released Tuesday to stop mass worksite deportation raids.
“The deployment of mass worksite operations, sometimes resulting in the simultaneous arrest of hundreds of workers, was not focused on the most pernicious aspect of our country’s unauthorized employment challenge: exploitative employers,” Mayorkas told to acting ICE Director Tae Johnson in the memo.
“These highly visible operations misallocated enforcement resources while chilling, and even serving as a retaliation for, worker cooperation in workplace standards investigations,” he added.
Mayorkas said the Biden administration would instead focus on penalizing employers who hire immigrants without work authorizations, rather than the immigrants themselves.
The memo also instructed DHS officials to consider temporary legal status for unauthorized immigrants who allegedly faced labor exploitation instead of immediately placing them in deportation proceedings.
Coverage from right-rated sources often framed the announcement as an example of government overreach and an unnecessary limitation of immigration enforcement. Some coverage from left-rated sources highlighted examples of large worksite raids carried out during the Trump administration and juxtaposed them with the Biden administration’s new directive.
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