On Aug. 17, the Collinsville Police Department became the latest area law enforcement agency to participate in the Task Force Model under an agreement between the City of Collinsville and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
The Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 added Section 287(g) to the Immigration and Nationality Act. The provision authorizes ICE to delegate certain immigration-enforcement functions to state and local law enforcement officers under ICE’s direction and oversight.
The 287(g) program offers three models:
• Jail Enforcement Model — Allows designated immigration officers to identify and process removable noncitizens who have pending or active criminal charges.
• Warrant Service Officer Model — Allows designated immigration officers to serve and execute administrative warrants on individuals in their custody.
• Task Force Model — Allows specially designated officers to exercise limited immigration-enforcement authority while performing routine police duties or participating in an ICE-led task force.
Several area police departments are participating in the Task Force Model. Under the program, a specially trained officer who encounters an individual during a routine law-enforcement action — such as a traffic stop — and determines that the individual may be unlawfully present in the United States can initiate the immigration-enforcement process.
“We have to have an illegal encounter with an individual before that step can take place,” Collinsville Police Chief Jon Cheshire said. “We will not conduct random stops or go door-to-door based solely on immigration status.”
Cheshire said the program offers several benefits to the department, including additional training, equipment and access to federal resources.
“This partnership means we have better trained officers, better equipped officers, with direct access to ICE information resources,” he said. “The program also opens up some financial resources, with benefits that will ease the burdens of our taxpayers.”
Participating departments can receive up to $100,000 toward a patrol vehicle and approximately $15,000 for each trained task force officer. Funding can be used for equipment, protective vests and information technology and software.
Police chiefs must nominate officers to participate in the program. Nominees must be full-time police officers with at least two years of experience and must complete 40 hours of online training. ICE must then approve the officers before they can participate.
“To participate in this program, we don’t do anything we don’t already do,” Cheshire said. “There’s no specialized unit. We simply perform our normal duties. Now we just take the enforcement actions. Immigration enforcement is nothing new. It’s a law. We’re going to enforce the law.”
If an individual encountered by Collinsville officers is determined to be unlawfully present in the country, the department reports the individual to an assigned ICE agent. ICE is responsible for handling immigration detainers and, when applicable, deportation proceedings.
“This doesn’t change our primary mission. We’re still taking calls and everything local is our priority. This is just another tool to enforce the law,” Cheshire said.
Collinsville is not the only local department to add the program to its law-enforcement toolbox. Tioga and Southmayd police departments have also joined the Task Force Model in recent months.
Southmayd Police Chief Jeff Laughlin has 15 years of experience working with federal agencies and said the concept of local and federal law-enforcement partnerships is nothing new.
“Federal agencies — the U.S. Marshal, the DEA, the FBI — they have thousands of agents on the streets because they create task forces in local areas,” Laughlin said. “Local agents are deputized as federal agents and they’re authorized to file federal cases. I’m employed by a local municipality, but I’ve been working in federal law for quite some time.”
Before joining the program, Southmayd officers who encountered someone during a DWI stop and suspected the individual might be unlawfully present in the country had limited ability to verify that claim. The jail would have to obtain the information.
Laughlin said the Task Force Model streamlines that process and provides the department with greater access to federal resources.
“It helps Grayson County, but it also helps us. We’re a small city with a low budget. Most small cities will take advantage of any grant they can get their hands on,” Laughlin said. “Without those services, smaller agencies couldn’t function the way we do. This partnership allows us to take some burden off our taxpayers.”
Like Cheshire, Laughlin emphasized that the program does not change how officers conduct routine policing.
“We’re not rounding up people on the street corner and checking their status. We don’t detain based on skin color,” Laughlin said. “And even if we do detain, it doesn’t mean that individual is getting deported. It simply gets them into the proper channel to follow legal procedure.”
“Most everyday citizens are living their lives and doing the right thing. With this program, we’re talking about people who are breaking the law,” he added.
For Southmayd, the program has been operating successfully. Collinsville is still awaiting ICE approval of its nominated officers, but local officials anticipate the department will soon be fully participating in the program.
As more small departments across Grayson County enter into 287(g) agreements, local law enforcement agencies are taking on a greater role in the federal immigration-enforcement process — while emphasizing that their primary responsibility remains serving and protecting their local communities.
