I blogged yesterday about Immigrations and Customs Enforcement scrapping its Scheduled Departure program that asked undocumented immigrants to turn themselves in. It seems that the Dept. of Homeland Security agency has quickly reverted to old habits– an ICE raid detained 350 workers yesterday at a factory in Laurel, Miss.

The New York Times’ Adam Nossiter compares the raid with one in Postville, Iowa in May that detained 400 undocumented workers. In the aftermath of that raid, immigrantion officials set up a makeshift court at the National Cattle Congress in Waterloo, Iowa. The cattle court flexed its power to imprison immigrants for using false documents.

For ICE, it doesn’t seem to matter if targeting entire swaths of workers and not their employers– or not going after more dangerous undocumented immigrants– is good public policy. It helps their apprehension statistics, proving they’re "tough on immigration."-MB

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