U.S. Halts Self-Deportation Project

In 3-Week Test, Just 8 Illegal Immigrants Volunteered to Leave

Despite drawing only eight volunteers, a three-week pilot program that urged some illegal immigrants to turn themselves in for deportation was not a failure, U.S. authorities declared yesterday.

Under the scrapped self-deportation program, called Operation Scheduled Departure, illegal immigrants in five cities who ignored court orders to leave the United States were offered as many as 90 days to put their affairs in order and to leave with family members in some cases, without the usual risk of arrest and detention.

The government estimates there are about 550,000 "fugitive aliens" nationwide, but the program was limited to individuals who have no criminal record and pose no threat to their communities or to national security. It was also limited to the estimated 30,000 eligible illegal immigrants living in Charlotte, Chicago, Phoenix, San Diego and Santa Ana, Calif.

Those who did turn themselves in included two Guatemalan immigrants, a couple from India and one person each from El Salvador, Estonia, Lebanon and Mexico.

James T. Hayes Jr., acting director of detention and removal operations for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said despite the results, the program taught ICE valuable lessons, mainly that it should continue raids and sweeps for illegal immigrants. He criticized immigrant advocates who object to such tactics, yet refused to urge eligible immigrants to participate in the program.

"This does show us that what advocacy groups . . . don't like is enforcement of the law," Hayes said. "I think we learned that the most effective means of restoring integrity to the nation's immigration system and to make this country safe from vulnerabilities is enforcement of immigration laws."

Charles H. Kuck, president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, said Hayes's comment showed that ICE is not interested in conducting effective and humane enforcement, such as improving abusive detention conditions, backlogged immigration courts or treatment of families with children.

"To call the effort halfhearted would give ICE half a heart too much credit," Kuck said. "It was never anything more than a public relations ploy so that ICE could say in the end: 'Gosh, we tried, but no one turned up. Now we can go back to doing enforcement our way.' "

Hayes said ICE spent about $41,000 on the pilot, including advertising costs, and averted the $54,000 it spends on average to catch, jail and remove eight fugitive immigrants, for a value to taxpayers of $13,000.

The agency is spending $218 million this year to remove fugitive immigrants and has caught 29,000, on pace to meet or exceed the 30,000 detained in the last fiscal year ending Sept. 30.

ICE estimated in 2004 that the fugitive backlog grows each year by 40,000 illegal immigrants who ignore new deportation orders.