Our Border With Mexico Is Like A Wound Without A Scab

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Approximately 25% of all federal prison inmates (about 54,000 in 2010) are aliens and 68% of them are from Mexico. From 2003 through 2009, the number of aliens in state and local prisons increased by about 10,000 per year, from 220,000 to almost 296,000.

Based on our random sample of 1,000 criminal aliens, we estimate that our study population of about 249,000 criminal aliens were arrested about 1.7 million times, averaging about 7 arrests per criminal alien, slightly lower than the 8 arrests per criminal alien we reported in 2005.23 They were arrested for a total of about 2.9 million offenses, averaging about 12 offenses per criminal alien, slightly lower than the 13 offenses per criminal alien we reported in 2005.24

The cost of maintaining these criminals is astronomical.

The estimated annual cost to incarcerate criminal aliens in BOP facilities plus SCAAP reimbursements ranged from about $1.5 billion in fiscal year 2005 to $1.6 billion in fiscal year 2009, as shown in figure 17. About 77 percent of these costs were associated with incarcerating criminal aliens in BOP facilities. In 2005, we estimated that the costs to incarcerate criminal aliens in BOP facilities along with SCAAP reimbursements ranged from about $1.5 billion in fiscal year 2001 to about $1.4 billion in fiscal year 2004.34 For data in fiscal year 2010 dollars, see appendix II. The cost to incarcerate criminal aliens in BOP facilities increased by about 15 percent from about $1.1 billion in fiscal year 2005 to about $1.3 billion in fiscal year 2009 due to increases in both the criminal alien population incarcerated and costs to incarcerate inmates in BOP facilities. SCAAP reimbursements to states and localities increased by about 5 percent from fiscal years 2005 to 2008.

Throw another $323 million in costs incurred by local and states on top of the $1.632 billion for federal criminal aliens and it cost about $2 billion in 2009 to house these morons.

The above stats are available here, from the United States Government Accountability Office, Report to Congressional Requesters: CRIMINAL ALIEN STATISTICS - Information on Incarcerations, Arrests, and Costs.