More criminals in the country illegally are deported

President Donald Trump's administration has deported thousands of immigrants with criminal convictions, moving forward on what Trump said he would do if elected to the White House.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the agency in charge of implementing immigration laws within the United States, said that in fiscal year 2018 it deported more than 145,000 immigrants with criminal convictions. Overall that year, it removed about 256,000 people. (A federal fiscal year runs from Oct. 1 through Sept. 30.)

The agency's report did not offer a breakdown of the type of crimes committed by the immigrants deported.

ICE news releases shows that among the deported during Trump's time in office include immigrants with criminal convictions for weapons trafficking, financial crimes, and felony involuntary manslaughter. (In that case, the man who was deported struck and killed another man in a parking lot.)

The number of convicted criminals deported in 2018 was slightly higher than the 128,000 deported in fiscal year 2017, which included about four months of the Obama administration.

ICE also reported close to 5,900 removals of known or suspected gang members in 2018 and about 5,400 in 2017.

At the same time, ICE said it removed 45 known or suspected terrorists in 2017 and 42 in 2018. There could be some overlap with the known or suspected gang members data, ICE said.

Overall, Trump has not backed away from his campaign calls to deport immigrants with criminal convictions. Through an executive order, he expanded the categories of people prioritized for deportation to include individuals charged with a criminal offense, even if not yet convicted.

We wanted to compare the number of people he's deported with the best estimates for the overall pool. In November 2016, after winning the presidential election, Trump claimed there could be as many as 2 or 3 million immigrants in the country illegally who were also criminals. We found that estimate to be based on assumptions, stemming from a Department of Homeland Security report covering fiscal years 2011-13. That report said U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement estimated there were 1.9 million "removable criminal aliens" in the United States at the time. The 1.9 million total included immigrants here legally and illegally.

The Migration Policy Institute in a 2015 report estimated that of that 1.9 million, there could be about 820,000 unauthorized immigrants with criminal convictions. The group's estimate is based on the assumption that unauthorized immigrants commit crimes at similar rates as other noncitizens.

Trump is making progress on his pledge to deport immigrants who commit crimes. We rate this In the Works.