ICE is Deporting Thousands with Minor Offenses — from Traffic Violations to Weed Possession

Contractor Hector Madrid Reyes was driving to Home Depot in March when he was rear-ended. As he and the other driver exchanged information, a Georgia State Patrol officer pulled up and asked for their licenses. Madrid, who arrived in the U.S. from Honduras as a teenager and was awaiting a court hearing for his asylum claim, didn’t have one.

“There’s no public transportation where we’re at, no Uber or Lyft,” said his wife, Jacqueline Maravilla, about his choice to drive. “Everything's 45 minutes from everything. It's a calculated risk we have to take to support our family.”

That risk has grown even greater for thousands of immigrant families under the Trump administration, as officials expand efforts to deport people with little or no criminal history. The monthly number of people deported whose most serious conviction was a traffic violation — such as driving without a license — has more than tripled in the last six months, hitting almost 600 in May, according to new estimates by The Marshall Project. In total, over 1,800 people with traffic violations have been deported this year.

People with no criminal convictions at all make up two-thirds of the more than 120,000 people deported between January and May. For another 8%, the only offense on their record was illegal entry to the U.S. Only about 12% were convicted of a crime that was either violent or potentially violent. The numbers contradict officials' continued claims that immigration enforcement is focusing on the “worst of the worst” criminal offenders. [MORE]