On Tuesday, Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced new details of the Justice Department’s plans to crack down on undocumented immigration to the U.S. Among other mandates, Sessions stated that those affiliated with gangs would be specially targeted for deportation, and that undocumented immigrants who had unlawfully entered the country in the past would be charged with felonies if they unlawfully re-entered a second time. Sessions also encouraged federal prosecutors to add charges of document fraud and aggravated identity theft whenever applicable. The latter charge carries a two-year mandatory minimum sentence.
Immigration detention is the fastest-growing type of incarceration in the United States, yet remains one of the least studied. In a new study published in the Law & Society Review, RSF grantee Emily Ryo (University of Southern California) examines immigrant detainees’ attitudes toward the law, legal authorities, and the U.S. criminal justice system. Ryo analyzes original survey data on long-term detainees and finds that—contrary to the claim advanced by Sessions and others that undocumented immigrants are likely to be criminals—the majority of detainees who were surveyed expressed “an obligation to obey the law at a significantly higher rate than other U.S. sample populations.” Ryo also finds that detainees who reported being treated with respect by guards and other staff at detention facilities were more likely to agree that people should accept the decisions of U.S. immigration authorities. In other words, Ryo’s research suggests that harsher or more punitive treatment of undocumented immigrants by the legal system and detention facilities may not lead to greater compliance with the law.
Following Sessions’s announcement, the number of immigrants who come into contact with legal authorities in the coming years will likely increase. Ryo’s research provides valuable insight into how undocumented immigrants make sense of their involvement in the U.S. legal system.
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