The majority of the immigrants taken into custody by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) are those with a criminal record, according to the Pew Research Center. The American think tank noted the changing trend on 15 February, revealing that 74 percent of those arrested by the agency had been convicted of a criminal offense before. This compares to 16 pending, who face criminal charges, and 11 percent without either.
The situation appears to be improving, based on the Center’s research, as well as previous data, compared to the released 2009 numbers, with a dramatic decrease in the number of arrests of criminal undocumented immigrants seen since 2009. The agency noted that these accounted for 61 percent of arrests in 2009, but that the figure fell sharply under the Obama administration.
The number of non-criminal immigrants arrested also fell, from 297,898, back in 2009, to 143,470 last year, when President Donald Trump began his tenure. Under Trump, the number of arrests of non-criminal undocumented immigrants jumped by 146 percent, with more than 22,000 such arrests. This compared to an increase of 12 percent in the arrest of undocumented immigrants with criminal convictions.
The most common category of criminal convictions for those arrested by ICE in 2017 was drunk driving, with no fewer than 59,985 convictions, and accounting for 16 percent of the total, followed by the selling or possession of dangerous drugs, at 15 percent, with 57,438 arrests.