July 13 (UPI) — An internal memo from the head of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement indicates the federal agency may expand its efforts to deport immigrants to countries where they do not hold citizenship.
The memo was sent by Todd Lyons, the acting director of the agency, agency employees last week after a Supreme Court decision in June that ruled that the deportation of eight immigrants to South Sudan was legally acceptable. Only one of the men was from South Sudan.
News of the memo, which was obtained by the Washington Post and The New York Times, came after a California cannabis farm worker died and more than 300 others were arrested during two raids on Thursday.
Lyons wrote in the memo that people could be sent to such third-party countries with as little as six hours’ notice as long as the receiving country has provided “credible diplomatic assurances” that the prisoners would not be subjected to torture or persecution, the Post and the Times reported.
ICE has argued that such third-country deportations are necessary because challenges the agency has faced when attempting to deport immigrants to their home countries. Since re-entering the White House, President Donald Trump and his administration have attempted to use such deportations as a method to quickly remove immigrants from the United States.
Still, the practice has faced questions about whether the United States is responsible for the safety of such immigrants after they have been deported, especially when they have been held under questionable conditions such those in El Salvador’s antiterrorism mega prison.
“The ramifications of Supreme Court’s order will be horrifying,” Trina Realmuto, executive director of the National Immigration Litigation Alliance, said in a statement in June. “It strips away critical due process protections that have been protecting our class members from torture and death.”
United Nations human rights experts last week expressed alarm at the implications of the Supreme Court ruling, saying it would lead to “enforced disappearances.”
“Other countries that have attempted to outsource their responsibilities have left people stranded in far away places, arbitrarily detained for years on end, and at risk of torture and other inhuman treatment, trafficking, or enforced disappearance,” the experts said in the U.N. statement.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Saturday that immigration authorities arrested a total of 319 migrants said to be in the country illegally. She said that authorities also rescued some 14 children from potential forced labor, exploitation and trafficking during the operation.
“Our hearts are heavy for the grieving family of Jaime Alanis, who died from injuries sustained during a chaotic raid on Thursday,” the United Farm Workers union said after the raid. “We will do everything we can to support them. We continue to work with the hundreds of farm worker families navigating the aftermath of this violent raid.”
The UFW union acknowledged in an earlier statement that it had recorded complaints of child labor at the site of the raids and noted that farmworkers are excluded from basic laws on child labor.
“Unfortunately, it’s not uncommon for teenagers to work in the field,” the union said. “Let’s be clear: detaining and deporting children is not a solution to child labor.”
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