The claim: The Biden administration invests Americans’ tax dollars to offer smartdevices to undocumented immigrants
Republicans sanctuary’t been shy about attacking President Joe Biden as soft on migration, and a claim flowing on social media includes to the chorus with an assertion about freegift cell phones.
“Waste: The Biden admin invested your tax dollars to offer cell phones to prohibited immigrants,” states an image published on Facebook on April 18 that racked up more than 1,300 shares within 4 days.
But the claim is misinforming.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a department of the Department of Homeland Security, does concern mobilephones with a pre-loaded app to some undocumented immigrants to makesure compliance with release specifications. But the phones can just be utilized to gainaccessto the app – they can’t gainaccessto the web, load other apps or make calls. And usage of them dates back to the Trump administration.
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USA TODAY reached out to the page that published the claim for remark, and its action did not obstacle the length of the program or the restricted nature of the cell phones.
Phones come with tracking app, puton’t have other abilities
The phones are utilized as part of ICE’s Alternatives to Detention program, which began in 2004 and utilizes innovation to “ensure noncitizen compliance with release conditions, court hearings and last orders of elimination,” an ICE spokesperson stated in a declaration to USA TODAY.
But the gadgets have had all other normal phone functions handicapped, so the phones are “solely restricted to the operates appointed for the functions of involvement in” the detention program, the declaration stated.
Deportation officers with ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations might thinkabout elements such as a individual’s criminal and migration history, household or neighborhood ties, status as a caretaker or supplier, or medical factorstoconsider to figureout whether they will be registered in the program, according to ICE. Technologies that might be designated to individuals consistof GPS tracking, telephonic reporting and the SmartLINK application.
Program individuals who are appointed to the SmartLINK choice and have their own smartdevices can download the app onto their individual gadgets Those who do not have smartdevices will be provided one from the firm.
“The gadget is locked and is notable to be utilized other than through the SmartLINK application,” the declaration said.
ICE stated the SmartLINK app sendsout push notices and tips for upcoming consultations; supplies a database for individuals to discover food banks, clothes or other neighborhood services; and permits users to upload and sendout files to their case experts.
If a individual is reassigned to a various guidance level or finishes the detention program, the gadget is returned to the company, the company said.
App in usage consideringthat Trump administration
The post associates the program to the Biden administration, however the SmartLINK app hasactually been utilized giventhat 2018, during the administration of President Donald Trump. Approximately 75% of non-citizens registered in the detention program usage SmartLINK, the firm stated.
The Associated Press reported in March that its use skyrocketed throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. It leapt from 5,000 in 2019 to 150,000 this year.
Fact check: Post misrep