The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced that it has conducted the largest immigration enforcement operation yet. Close to 1,500 illegal aliens were rounded up in the Boston area, with half of them having been convicted of crimes.
“The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a safer place today thanks to the hard work and determination of the men and women of ICE and our federal partners. Working together, we were able to arrest almost 1,500 illegal aliens throughout the Commonwealth, most of whom had significant criminality in the United States or abroad,” said ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations Boston acting Field Office Director Patricia H. Hyde. “Make no mistake: Every person that we arrested was breaking our immigration laws, but most of these individuals had significant criminality. They are criminal offenders who victimized innocent people and traumatized entire communities — murderers, rapists, drug traffickers, child sex predators and members of violent transnational criminal gangs. Some were convicted of violent crimes in the United States, and others were wanted for criminality in their native countries. All made the mistake of attempting to subvert justice by hiding out in Massachusetts.”
BREAKING: Multiple ICE sources confirm to@FoxNews that ICE targeted Massachusetts & Boston in its biggest operation yet, netting the arrests of 1,461 illegal aliens in MA & the Greater Boston area. 790 had criminal convictions or charges, while 277 had final orders of removal/deportation orders. The operation ended on Saturday.
The operation, dubbed “Patriot”, ran during the month of May, and it was launched in direct response to sanctuary policies in Massachusetts & Boston, ICE sources tells FOX.
VISIT OUR YOUTUBE CHANNELFox is told that hundreds of the arrested targets had been released by sanctuary jurisdictions in MA in cases where ICE detainers were ignored.
ICE plans to hold a press conference in Boston later this morning to announce the details of the operation.
FOX embedded with ICE in the greater Boston area on Thursday as part of this operation. We were with 1 of 19 ICE teams deployed across Massachusetts that day, and we witnessed the arrests of an international murderer, two child rapists (one of whom was living next to a playground), one fentanyl trafficker, one adult rapist, and one child sexual assaulter, all in just a few hours.
The operation also included the arrests of so called “collaterals”, illegal aliens who weren’t ICE’s priority, but were with the person they were targeting. ICE has repeatedly warned that sanctuary policies will lead to collateral arrests, as ICE has to go out into the community to make arrests of criminal aliens on the streets, rather than having them transferred from the local jurisdiction at jail.
Prior to Operation Patriot, Operation Tidal Wave in Florida was the largest operation ICE had run, which led to 1,120 arrests. But Fox is told Patriot was a significantly more difficult operation, because unlike in Florida, ICE says they received little to zero cooperation from local jurisdictions throughout Massachusetts. ICE also tells FOX they encountered almost daily interference from local anti-ICE activists throughout the operation.
