Each day, over 30,000 people are housed within detention centers across the United States. The New York-based Detention Watch Network says that last year, over 276,000 immigrants were deported. Deportations have increased significantly since 1996, when laws became much more punitive. A criminal charge results in jail time and guarantees deportation of non-citizen immigrants, regardless of legal status and family ties.

Attempts to re-haul the US immigration system were made in 2006. Since that effort failed, no comprehensive reform has made it to the table, and the pressure has been stepped up on Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, to ramp up its deportation activities.