‘Miscalculation’ causes ICE to underreport illegal immigrants released without tracking technology by over 18,000%

Immigration and Customs Enforcement claimed that a “data miscalculation” caused the agency to underreport the number of illegal immigrants released into the United States without tracking technology by over 18,000%, the Daily Caller News Foundation reported.

During a private event hosted by ICE last week, the agency distributed documents to attendees about the 2004 “Alternatives to Detention” program. The initiative was launched as a “flight-mitigation tool” to track illegal immigrants using ankle bracelets and cell phones while they await scheduled court proceedings.

According to the internal document obtained by the DCNF, as of November 14, ICE had released 49,459 illegal immigrants without any tracking technology. The reported figure on the document vastly differed from the stats on ICE’s website, which stated that only 266 immigrants were released without ankle monitors or cell phones as of November 19.

Additionally, the document revealed that only 8,118 illegal immigrants were released with GPS tracking devices as of November 14. According to ICE’s website, the agency reported that 56,805 illegal immigrants were being monitored using GPS trackers as of November 19 – a 600% difference.

“The Biden administration is hostile to transparency, and when it does publish data, it refuses to respond to media inquiries regarding significant discrepancies like this,” a former ICE official told the DCNF. “Likely, ICE communication staffers are having a lot of difficulty defending this administration’s chaotic and lawless policies.”

DCNF reached out to ICE last week to reconcile the reporting discrepancies. On Wednesday, the agency updated its website to state that 49,166 illegal immigrants are not being tracked while 7,905 are being monitored using GPS tracking devices.

“Upon further inspection of what participants were provided against what was publicly available online, it became clear there was a data miscalculation. Teams worked quickly to address and reconcile the issue, now updated on ICE.gov. We regret ICE provided erroneous ATD enrollment data and worked to resolve the miscalculation going forward,” an ICE spokesperson told the news outlet.

“U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) recently hosted a symposium to share ideas and inform future concepts for the Alternatives to Detention (ATD) program,” the ICE spokesperson continued. “The event was held at ICE headquarters with more than 100 stakeholders from nongovernmental organizations, academia, and private industry in attendance. Prior to the event, attendees were provided handouts with background information on the ATD program.”