Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti announced today that a successful lawsuit by his office forced U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to disclose previously hidden information about the release of thousands of detained migrants, including dangerous convicted criminals.
The documents reveal ICE’s since-abandoned plan to transport potentially thousands of “single adult” immigration detainees into Tennessee.
The records show that ICE’s plan to release detainees into the state was halted after strong opposition from Tennessee’s Governor and U.S. Senators, and was ultimately stopped through litigation by Tennessee’s Attorney General’s Office, alongside other states.
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Despite abandoning the plan, ICE still released over 7,000 detainees from its Louisiana facilities, including more than 30 individuals classified as the highest security threats. The released detainees had criminal histories that included offenses such as homicide, sexual assault, armed robbery, kidnapping, drug trafficking, and more.
“The federal government’s single most important job is to keep dangerous people out of our country and instead it has let killers and rapists illegally cross our border and walk free on our streets,” said Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti. “While the urgent work to fix our broken immigration system continues in Washington, my Office will keep fighting for transparency and accountability.”
In December 2022, Tennessee’s Governor learned that ICE had been working with local immigration-rights groups and Nashville officials to release large numbers of detainees into the state, coinciding with the anticipated end of the federal Title 42 public health order. In response, the Attorney General’s Office quickly sought answers from the federal government. When ICE failed to respond to the state’s Freedom of Information Act requests, the Attorney General’s Office filed a lawsuit.
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The lawsuit resulted in ICE producing hundreds of pages of records, which revealed:
- Coordination between ICE, Nashville city officials, and a Tennessee immigration nonprofit to arrange the mass release of detainees into the state.
- Plans by ICE to release thousands of single adult, non-citizen detainees from Louisiana detention facilities into Tennessee.
- Data showing that many of the released detainees had violent criminal records, including murder, rape, and kidnapping.
The Tennessee Attorney General’s Office continues to push for transparency in immigration policies and practices to ensure the safety of its citizens.
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