This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Thursday, August 10th, 2017.

I'm Keeble Brown.

The federal program to deputize local law enforcement as federal immigration agents is expanding.

What does that mean for federalism and local control of policing?

The program's record is less than stellar.

Matthew Feeney, a policy analyst at the Cato Institute, details the federal

287G program.

287G is a program that allows law enforcement agencies across the country to enter into an agreement with ICE,

which is immigration and customs enforcement, so that they can carry out certain immigration law

enforcement duties when they're in jails or out in the field.

So what this means is that local cops who have a 287G agreement, if they have what is called

a jail enforcement agreement can process removable aliens at the jail.

They can issue their own detainers and interrogate people based on suspected immigration violations.

There was another kind of agreement

that was called a task force agreement

that the Obama administration announced

at the end of 2012 it was dropping, which actually allowed police officers out in the

field to carry out certain immigration enforcement duties but that was scrapped but

it's worth noting that in February, then DHS Secretary John Kelly did

explicitly mention perhaps a return to that kind of 287g model.

So why was that introduced?

Why was this task force model started in the first place?

...