Program will let some illegal immigrants self deport, avoid arrest

Under a test program dubbed “Operation Scheduled Departure,” non-criminal illegal immigrants with final removal orders will have an opportunity to self-deport and avoid arrest and detention, said Jim Hayes, acting director of the office of detention and removal at Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Starting next Tuesday, Aug. 5, and running through Aug. 22, eligible illegal immigrants will be able to turn themselves in at Immigration and Customs Enforcement offices in Phoenix, San Diego, Santa Ana, Calif., Chicago and Charlotte, he said. They’ll be granted up to 90 days to schedule their departure, Hayes said.

The program doesn’t offer any monetary compensation or a path to legalization.

“The benefit is not being detained and being allow to make arrangements for their families and themselves to join them or to schedule their departure,” Hayes said. “But there is very little chance with an individual who has a final order of removal, that they are going to be eligible for any other type of benefit.”

Illegal immigrants who don’t have final removal orders that choose to self deport won’t be turned away but they won’t be eligible for the benefits of the program, Hayes said. They would be processed under current policy and whether or not they are detained would be determined by their length of time in the country, if they have a criminal history and their ties to the community, he said.

Immigrant advocacy groups as well as anti-illegal immigrant organizations expressed skepticism that the program will entice many illegal immigrants to self deport. Without offering monetary compensation or a path to legalization, there’s little reason for somebody to turn themselves in.

Illegal immigrants in Arizona, especially, could decide to go home on their own whenever they want, said Jennifer Allen, director of Tucson-based Border Action Network. In addition, many immigrant families are a mixture of parents and children with and without legal paperwork, which makes it that much more unlikely, she said.

“People would be putting at risk other family members who are here and have their paperwork,” Allen said. “So, what is the incentive for a mother to go turn herself in when her children are U.S. citizens?”

Hayes, however, considers it a realistic expectation that some — he wouldn’t estimate how many — of the estimated 572,000 fugitive illegal immigrants in the United States would take advantage of the opportunity. Fugitives immigrants are defined as those who have been given a final removal order but not reported to an immigration office. Of that group, an estimated 457,000 of them are believed to be non-criminal illegal immigrants and would be eligible for the program, Hayes said.

Officials are also expecting help from immigrant advocacy groups and faith-based organizations, Hayes said.

“We think this is a great opportunity for those advocacy groups and faith-based organizations who have asked us to look at other ways to conduct fugitive operations to really step up to the table and bring their clients into us and work with us to schedule their departure,” Hayes said. “We’ve been hearing from advocacy groups that this is something that they’d support and that fugitive aliens would simply surrender themselves if such an opportunity presented itself and we’re hopeful this is the opportunity.”

Radio and print advertisements in Spanish and English will begin appearing in the participating cities next week, said Cori Bassett, spokeswoman with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The cities were chosen where ICE had the staffing available to handle the rpogram and to have locations spread out across the country, Hayes said.

The program is modeled after a U.S. Marshals program called “Fugitive Safe Surrender” that offers non-violent criminals with arrest warrants an opportunity to turn themselves in, Bassett said.