The Trump administration is planning to shift up to $155 million from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to immigration enforcement operations. In addition, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is also relocating an additional $116 million from elsewhere in the department. In total, $271 million will be transferred to the DHS immigration enforcement agencies.
FEMA addressed the relocation of funds in a statement to CNN, “The DRF Majors account, which provides funding for ongoing recovery efforts, including those supporting communities impacted by the 2017 disasters, has a current balance of approximately $27 billion and is not impacted by the reprogramming.”
The DHS had already informed congress that it will be relocating the $116 million on July 26. All of the funding will be rerouted to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and will be used for additional detention beds, transportation and deportation according to officials.
As for the newly announced $155 million, it is likely to fund the Trump administration’s new rule of holding families indefinitely. Previously there was a 20-day limit on how long they can be detained, however, with the new rule comes the need for more money because the numbers will grow significantly.
With the recent influx of immigrants causing the DHS to be spread thin, certain agencies in the department require more funding to continue operations. Just in the last fiscal year nearly 760,000 immigrants have been arrested for entering illegally.
Previous spending bills have accounted for an average of 45,274 detention beds per day with the goal of lowering the number to 40,520 by the end of the fiscal year. However the administration requested funding for 52,000 beds, with the new relocation of funds the number will be around 50,000. This still isn’t quite enough considering as of August 10th 55,350 people are in immigrant detention.
As for how some of the money being diverted other than to ICE, $23.8 million will be moved to the Transportation Security Administration for immigration enforcement and $4.3 million will go to the DHS cyber agency.
