Month: March 2026

Criminal vs non criminal arrests

It has been well known that arrests by ICE of unauthorized persons have been trending towards persons without a criminal record. This report provides clear evidence of how that trend evolved in 2025. The report looks at arrests through October 2025.

In October, 2024, an average of 200 persons a day were taken by ICE from local jails or other lock ups, versus about 75 from worksites and other locations.  By October 2025, the average daily arrest rate for each hovered around 550.

Throughout, DHS was saying that it was detaining the “worst of the worst.” It could loosely back that up with the arrests from jails and from the probably extremely low numbers of persons with a lurid criminal background that ICE arrested on the streets.

However, the trends documented in this report indicate that to boost arrests from the 1,000 person a day level to much higher requires either more states to agree to allow coordination between local jails and ICE, or to arrest a lot more outside of jails. This is not news.

A question: does this history in any way imply in any reasonable way that unauthorized persons are relatively more criminal than authorized persons?  One can firmly say no – but there is one characteristic that should be recognized.  I do not have the figures before me now, but I believe that, at least perhaps 15 years ago, the unauthorized populations contained relatively more poor, young men – whose run-ins with the law are higher in American society.   The studies showing that the crime rate among unauthorized is lower than among others I trust – but also note that the demographics, at least in the past, might suggest otherwise.

Again, Drivers of global migration

The share of the world’s population living outside one’s native country has grown from  2.3% in 1970 to 3.7% today.   The number of persons born in India who live in the U.S. from from 51,000 in 1970 to about 3 million today. Both trends show the impact of access to and costs of transportation, communications, finance and higher education.  The impact of a global educated cohort on economies and societies is a core aspect of life today.

I addressed this topic in a 2022 posting on seven drivers of migration. Here is more meat on the bone, with India as a case study.

Transportation. Containerization reduced the cost of shipping goods by as much as 90% percent over several decades, linking labor markets more tightly to global demand and in the way creating a mobile skilled manufacturing work and entrepreneurial force.  A round-trip intercontinental airplane ticket that once represented a prohibitive share of income became affordable even for middle-income households in emerging economies. Migration no longer required a permanent break. It could be a real option, be repeated, and allow for circular / multi-country residence and work.

Financial infrastructure. The creation of SWIFT standardized cross-border bank transfers. What once required days and paper documentation moved to electronic confirmation. Digital payment platforms and mobile wallets are now reducing remittances from 6% and some hours or days to well under 1% and instant transfer.

Communication. In 1970, a brief international phone call was expensive and an effort. Today,  voice and video calls across continents are effectively free at the margin, carried over internet networks. Information about jobs, wages, and conditions now circulates instantly.

Meanwhile, higher education expanded rapidly across Asia, Latin America, and parts of Africa. University enrollment multiplied several times over, producing large cohorts of engineers, nurses, technicians, and managers. With portable skills and lower mobility costs, many participate in migration patterns that are increasingly circular rather than permanent, linking origin and destination economies in sustained exchange.

Where this shows up most dramatically

Indians in the U.S. For the United States, decennial census tabulations show the India-born population rising from 51,000 (1970) to 206,087 (1980) to 450,406 (1990) to 1,022,552 (2000). It is about 3 million today. Mostly STEM + other high-skill knowledge work: computer/IT, engineering, and other science/technical roles, with a significant presence in health professions and management/business.  My recent posts have shown how entrepreneurial investment in India drew from American experience. The same can be said for Indians in Canada.

Warrantless and Preemptive arrests

In a court case before an Alabama district court, attorneys say DHS has adopted a three-pronged policy of aggressive arrest and detention. The case involves Leonardo Garcia Venegas, a U.S. citizen construction worker of Mexican descent, twice detained during immigration raids at private, non-public construction sites despite presenting an Alabama REAL ID:

The brief alleges DHS has adopted a Warrantless Entry Policy permitting officers to enter fenced, posted construction sites and partially built homes without judicial warrants, treating them as “open areas.” It also alleges a Preemptive Detention Policy under which officers detain Latino construction workers based on appearance and occupation alone, without individualized suspicion, effectively replacing targeted investigation with mass, location-based sweeps. Finally, it alleges a Continued Detention Policy authorizing officers to maintain custody even after individuals present documentation establishing lawful presence, including DHS-certified REAL IDs.

They assert there are  agency-wide directives reflecting a reinterpretation of DHS authority, constitute final agency action, and violate the Fourth Amendment, federal statutes, and binding regulations. The plaintiffs do not have smoking gun internal documents. They rely on public DHS press releases and memoranda, including references to a Lyons Memo authorizing use of administrative warrants, public statements, ICE training materials cited in other litigation, news reports, and repeated on-the-ground enforcement conduct, including the plaintiff’s own detentions.