Sitting US President Donald Trump has been criticising some of the United States’ historic laws, specifically in the realm of Immigration legislation, and specifically the policies that were passed through Congress by his old rivals, the Democratic Party. He recently called some of their past laws and policies “ridiculous” and “dumb,” and included just one example – the “Catch And Release” policy. So, what is that policy?
The “catch and release” policy is the simplistic name used to describe the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the US Customs and Border Protection’s protocols for dealing with any undocumented citizens they used to find.
The immigrants were allowed to be released from custody while they waited for a fair trial in front of an immigration judge. Sounds fair enough, right? Well, the Republican Party’s lawmakers don’t see it that way, and that’s why it doesn’t exist anymore.
The Bush administration took care of this policy
George W. Bush and his administration made short work of the Democrats’ “catch and release” policy once he got into the White House for his second term. The protocol was officially eradicated in 2006, when it no longer had to be followed by US immigration enforcement agencies when they found undocumented citizens to be residing in America.
