Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) Section 287(g), codified at 8 U.S.C. § 1357(g), was added to the INA by section 133 of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (Division C, Title I of the Omnibus Consolidated Appropriations Act of 1997, Pub.L. 104–208, 110 Stat. 3001, enacted September 30, 1996). Section 287(g) authorizes the Federal Government to enter into agreements with state and local law enforcement agencies, permitting designated officers to perform immigration law enforcement functions, pursuant to a memorandum of agreement, provided that the local law enforcement officers receive appropriate training and function under the supervision of sworn U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers. Under 287(g), with federal approval and training, ICE provides state and local law enforcement officers with the training and authorization to identify, process, and--when appropriate--detain immigration offenders they encounter during their regular, daily law-enforcement activity.
The March 2010 arrest of undocumented student Jessica Colotl sparked an intense debate around immigration issues, with Colotl's supporters calling for an end to 287(g). Colotl was arrested in Cobb County, Georgia, which has 287(g) legislation, and faces deportation.
The National Sheriffs Association has issued a position paper supporting the expansion of 287(g), stating: "It is critical that local law enforcement maintain and build upon the partnerships with federal law enforcement to ensure that collectively we can promote, protect, and preserve the public safety and homeland security."
Famous quotes containing the words immigration, nationality, act and/or section:
“I was interested to see how a pioneer lived on this side of the country. His life is in some respects more adventurous than that of his brother in the West; for he contends with winter as well as the wilderness, and there is a greater interval of time at least between him and the army which is to follow. Here immigration is a tide which may ebb when it has swept away the pines; there it is not a tide, but an inundation, and roads and other improvements come steadily rushing after.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“If nationality is consent, the state is compulsion.”
—Henri-Frédéric Amiel (1821–1881)
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—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“... all my letters are read. I like that. I usually put something in there that I would like the staff to see. If some of the staff are lazy and choose not to read the mail, I usually write on the envelope “Legal Mail.” This way it will surely be read. It’s important that we educate everybody as we go along.”
—Jean Gump, U.S. pacifist. As quoted in The Great Divide, book 2, section 10, by Studs Terkel (1988)