The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Office of Inspector General (OIG) has released a damning report revealing significant flaws in communication between U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), resulting in the release of a migrant identified on the Terrorist Watchlist.
According to the report, titled “CBP Released a Migrant on a Terrorist Watchlist, and ICE Faced Information Sharing Challenges Planning and Conducting the Arrest,” CBP “apprehended and subsequently released a migrant without providing information requested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Terrorist Screening Center (TSC) that would have confirmed the migrant was a positive match with the Terrorist Screening Data Set (Terrorist Watchlist).”
The report explicitly pointed out the problems stemming from CBP’s “ineffective practices and processes for resolving inconclusive matches with the Terrorist Watchlist,” which led to a series of errors.
“For example, CBP sent a request to interview the migrant to the wrong email address, obtained information requested by the TSC but never shared it, and released the migrant before fully coordinating with the TSC,” the document reads.
After the migrant was finally confirmed as a positive match with the Terrorist Watchlist, the report revealed that ICE had to overcome “multiple challenges sharing information within ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations while planning and conducting the arrest.”
The bureaucratic hurdles and lack of efficient information sharing resulted in ICE apprehending the migrant “more than 2 weeks after the migrant’s release.”
The OIG’s report came with three recommendations, all of which are aimed at improving information sharing within CBP and ICE. The two agencies have agreed to all three suggestions.
The OIG requested that, upon full implementation of the recommendations, the agencies should “submit a formal closeout letter to us within 30 days” along with “evidence of completion of agreed-upon corrective actions.”
The OIG concluded by stating it would “provide copies of our report to congressional committees with oversight and appropriation responsibility over the Department of Homeland Security.”
A redacted version of the report will be posted on the OIG’s website.
This case underlines the importance of clear, efficient communication and data sharing between government agencies, especially when national security is at stake.
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