ICE is not deporting Americans — just stop (Opinion)

On an interesting related note to the immigration discussion we've been having for the past few days, I thought I'd address something I heard recently.

One of my libertarian friends shared a criticism of some of the ICE-detractors claiming that American citizens being mistakenly held in detention centers and being deported! Well as you can imagine, that caught my attention. So I did a little research...

First of all, those detained in reported cases were arrested for committing other crimes or they were children of illegal immigrants. So this idea that Immigration and Customs Enforcement is profiling and rounding up Americans just to add to the detention centers is absurd.

Second, the estimate for the number of Americans caught up in the immigration enforcement web between 2007 and 2015 was approximately 1,500 people. To put that in perspective, during that time, under President Obama's leadership, the US Government deported more than 350,000 people each year. That's an eight-year total of 2.8 million people.

In case you're doing the math, the percentage of Americans caught up in the sweep amount to less than one half of one percent of those detained. Then you add in the hundreds of thousands arrested and detained by not deported and the mistake becomes infinitesimal. Now if you're one of the 1,488 reportedly held, you might disagree, but then take a deeper look at those folks and you'll find many charged with or with prior convictions for crimes. So let's not pretend that ICE is the bad guy here. If you're caught up in the ICE net, it's most likely entirely your fault and I'm having a hard time feeling sorry for you.

Interesting thing regarding deportations for the Trump haters out there that you should know:

Now with better border security under President Trump the number of deportations have dropped to less than 250,000 per year. Among those deportees, approximately half were convicted criminals. It's irresponsible at best and agenda driven propaganda at worst designed on destroying the reputation of hero LEOs. None of this by the way, was used by the main stream media while Obama was President.

Yes, mistakes happen. But the men and women of ICE are working hard every day in order to keep us safe and rid the country of criminals who should've never been here in the first place. And if one criminal who committed a heinous crime ends up deported, is that soooo bad?

I spoke with the Acting Field Office Director for ICE-ERO Newark, Ruben Perez, and he sets the record straight about "sanctuary state".

Bill Spadea is on the air weekdays from 6 to 10 a.m., talkin’ Jersey, taking your calls at 1-800-283-1015. Tweet him @NJ1015 or @BillSpadea. The opinions expressed here are solely those of Bill Spadea.

More from New Jersey 101.5: