(NewsNation) — After President Donald Trump vowed to secure the U.S.-Mexico border as part of his administration, operations to seek out and apprehend migrants who have been convicted of certain crimes and ordered to leave the country have begun in earnest.
The Fugitive Operations Task Force plays a critical role in the mission to apprehend immigrants who have been ordered to leave the country but have not. Task force members are part of a detail within the Immigration and Customs Enforcement removal operations division, which has operated for years but is now taking on an expanded role with border enforcement.
Since Trump took office Monday, data shows that more than 470 arrests of migrants have taken place. NewsNation has also learned that encounters between immigration officials and migrants have dropped significantly this week.
Migrant arrests have remained steady over the past month, according to data obtained by NewsNation, but are expected to grow with Trump in office.
Officers assigned to the detail work off of dockets that include information detailing criminal and noncriminal migrants who are being sought by federal immigration officials. Trump and border czar Tom Homan have said that they are prioritizing immigrants with criminal convictions as part of their mass deportation efforts.
Most of those on the docket who have criminal records have been convicted of murder, rape and drug offenses. Task force members are given the choice of who they will go after and obtain an immigration warrant, which allows them to place the migrant being sought in custody.
According to information obtained by NewsNation from the Department of Homeland Security, more than 1.46 million migrants are included on the dockets. However, while sanctuary cities like Chicago, Denver and New York are bracing for ICE raids intended to locate migrants found on the dockets, much of the task force’s work involves more of a more methodical search.
“This isn’t going to be ICE officers running down the streets pointing at people trying to see, ‘Hey – you look Hispanic – we’re going to pick you up,’” Victor Avila, a retired DHS special agent, told NewsNation. “That’s not going to happen here. It is going to be methodical. It’s targeted towards a certain individual.
“These individuals know who they are. They’re wanted. They’re here illegally.”
Data obtained by NewsNation shows that while encounters hovered around 4,000 during the final days of former President Joe Biden’s administration, that number dropped to just 1,940 encounters the first two days Trump was in office. As of 8 p.m. Wednesday, daily encounters were limited to 440 for the day, data indicated.