Advances in U.S.-Mexico Border Enforcement: A Review of the Consequence Delivery System
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Highlights
The Consequence Delivery System used by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) reduced recidivism. But its deterrence assumptions no longer fit changing border flows.
- The share of migrants apprehended more than once in the same fiscal year fell from 29 percent in fiscal year (FY) 2007 to 14 percent in FY 2014, a reduction the Border Patrol attributes in part to the Consequence Delivery System (CDS).
- The system was designed to address Mexican adult males willing to attempt repeat crossings—a population no longer dominant at the border, where Central American women and children fleeing violence now constitute a growing share.
- For Central American families and unaccompanied children, many CDS consequences—including lateral repatriation and criminal prosecution—are operationally infeasible or legally inapplicable.
- To remain effective, the system must revise its underlying assumptions, improve data collection on non-Mexican migrants, and develop consequence strategies suited to populations with protection needs.
Questions about how to best secure the U.S.-Mexico border are central to U.S. immigration policy and debates around reforming U.S. immigration laws. In fiscal year (FY) 2011, the U.S. Border Patrol began implementing what it terms the Consequence Delivery System (CDS), its first systematic attempt to employ metrics of effectiveness and efficiency to the different forms of removal and other enforcement consequences that migrants face after being apprehended at the Southwest border.
This report presents findings from a year-long study that included analysis of previously unpublished CDS data provided to MPI by the Border Patrol as well as fieldwork in the Tucscon and Rio Grande Valley sectors, discussing which consequence measures may be most effective in deterring illegal migration. As the Border Patrol has shifted towards greater use of formal removal and away from voluntary return, its use of consequences and allocation of resources—including expedited removal, lateral repatriation, and criminal prosecution via Streamline—have been measured and guided by CDS. Overall, the share of migrants apprehended more than once in the same fiscal year fell from 29 percent in FY 2007 to 14 pecent in FY 2014.
Ultimately, while CDS has become an important tool that informs Border Patrol priorities, the authors find that some of its underlying assumptions about effectiveness and deterrence may be less applicable to the U.S.-Mexico border today than in the past. The shift from majority Mexican arrivals to new and diverse migrant groups, particularly women and children fleeing violence in Central America, has both limited the consequences the Border Patrol can impose and revealed limitations in data collection. Tackling these challenges will be essential to future enforcement strategy and policymaking.
Table of Contents
I. Introduction
II. Background
III. The Border Patrol’s Enforcement with Consequences
IV. The Consequence Delivery System
A. Migrant Classifications
B. Groups Not Classified in CDS
V. Analyzing the Effectiveness of Consequences
A. Effectiveness of Individual Consequences
B. Effectiveness across Migrant Classifications
C. Effectiveness across Border Sectors
VI. Analyzing the Efficiency of Consequences
A. Resource Requirements of Selected Consequences
B. Variations in Efficiency across Sectors
VII. The Accomplishments and Limitations of CDS
Appendix: Case Studies of CDS Implementation in the Two Busiest Border Control Sectors
A. Tucson Sector
B. Rio Grande Valley Sector
About the U.S. Immigration Policy Program
The U.S. Immigration Policy Program provides analysis of U.S. immigration pathways, the impacts of enforcement and other policies, and the characteristics of immigrant populations.
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