ICE set to begin immigration raids in 10 cities on Sunday

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Immigration and Customs Enforcement is pressing forward to arrest and deport families with court-ordered removals in 10 cities beginning Sunday, according to a senior immigration official, after President Donald Trump's tweet revealing an operation was imminent.

But acting Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan has been hesitant about elements of the operation, according to two sources familiar with his thinking.

ICE has said it was considering options to arrest and deport families who have gone through their legal proceedings but has refrained from publicly providing the scope and timeframe of the operation, which officials say could lead to a situation where a family is separated and could cause a backlash against the department.
To that end, Trump's tweet Monday night that ICE, the enforcement arm of DHS, was preparing to deport "millions" of undocumented immigrants next week was striking, given the figure and the decision to disclose an operation prior to its execution

A senior administration official told CNN the operation had been planned for some time, but said the tweet had put the operation at the forefront.

"Certainly, the President's tweet helped prioritize things for people," the official said, adding that there had been internal debate about timing amid negotiations with Congress on additional funding and the upcoming 2020 budget.
The official added that "there has been an effort to communicate what is likely to happen, without saying specifically when and where," contrary to the "zero tolerance" policy which was done without much advance notice to the media or Capitol Hill.

Field agents at local field offices are receiving briefings and trainings, according to a senior immigration official. There are also preparations being put in place for mixed-immigration status families: for example, if a parent is undocumented, but has a US citizen child.

administration official told CNN the operation had been planned for some time, but said the tweet had put the operation at the forefront.

"Certainly, the President's tweet helped prioritize things for people," the official said, adding that there had been internal debate about timing amid negotiations with Congress on additional funding and the upcoming 2020 budget.
The official added that "there has been an effort to communicate what is likely to happen, without saying specifically when and where," contrary to the "zero tolerance" policy which was done without much advance notice to the media or Capitol Hill.

Field agents at local field offices are receiving briefings and trainings, according to a senior immigration official. There are also preparations being put in place for mixed-immigration status families: for example, if a parent is undocumented, but has a US citizen child.

year, at the request of DHS, the Justice Department put together the accelerated family court docket or the so-called "rocket docket," according to a former administration official.

"The goal was to get to consequence quicker," so that "people would get their hearings, they would get ordered removed, and then a significant number" of people would be put back into ICE custody and removed from the US, said the official.

Sometime around March, ICE officials took additional planning steps. The former acting ICE Director Ron Vitiello had several conversations about a potential operation with then-Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, who at the time requested additional information, according to the official. But before DHS was fully prepared to carry out the operation, both Nielsen and Vitiello left the administration amid a purge of top DHS officials in April.

There was an understanding that an operation targeting families would be "tough and difficult" for everyone involved, said the official.

"You go to a home that's a family and maybe the father is present, but the mother is not or vice versa. People are in medical care. Other members of the family may be in legal status," said the former official. "There's a lot of stuff to consider in a situation like this."

Additionally, there were also discussions about family separation and whether this operation would comply with current court orders, as well as the President's executive order to end family separation.

Trump's tweet about a massive operation came on the eve of his re-election rally. The President had made illegal immigration a cornerstone of his 2016 campaign and appeared to be reverting back to that message hours before taking the stage in Orlando.

But the mass deportations he previously warned of haven't materialized and deportation numbers have lagged behind those seen during Obama's presidency.

Staffing limitations and budget constraints generally limit how many people the US can detain and deport -- and how quickly that process happens. Deporting millions of people would cost far more than Immigration and Customs Enforcement's current budget allows -- and require a vast amount of resources.

President Trump on Saturday delayed a wave of roundups of undocumented families which immigration authorities were expected to start carrying out Sunday. Mr. Trump nevertheless threatened to order mass deportations unless congressional Democrats agreed to revamp the nation's asylum laws within two weeks.

His stunning reversal came as immigrant advocates across major U.S. cities had been mounting an unprecedented campaign to prepare undocumented immigrants for a highly publicized operation in which Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) was expected to target more than 2,000 families with pending deportations orders.

"At the request of Democrats, I have delayed the Illegal Immigration Removal Process (Deportation) for two weeks to see if the Democrats and Republicans can get together and work out a solution to the Asylum and Loophole problems at the Southern Border," Mr. Trump wrote on Twitter Saturday afternoon. "If not, Deportations start!"

Earlier Saturday, Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi made a last-ditch attempt to convince the president to halt the roundups — which she said would result in "collateral damage" to children, who could be U.S. citizens, of undocumented immigrants.

It is unclear if the president relented because of concerns raised by Democrats — as he claimed in his Twitter post — or because of the political damage the raids could've inflicted on his agenda. Republicans and Democrats in Congress are currently negotiating legislation to allocate funds to different agencies, including ICE, that are dealing with the large-scale migration of Central American families and unaccompanied children to the U.S.-Mexico border. Last month, border apprehensions hit a 13-year high.

Any massive deportation blitz would provoke significant public outcry and possibly derail negotiations in Congress, as Democrats — some of whom have called for ICE's abolishment — could refuse to sign-off on funding for any type of immigration enforcement as long as ICE targeted families with removal orders but no criminal history.

Although somewhat relived, immigrant advocates said the president's unexpected announcement on Saturday just fueled more confusion and anxiety in immigrant communities.