The Biden administration has dismantled and replaced a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office created during the Trump presidency to help victims of crimes committed by immigrants in a further break with his predecessor’s border policies.
Trump launched VOICE (Victim Of Immigration Crime Engagement Office) in an executive order during his first week in office in 2017.
VOICE “was created to acknowledge and serve the needs of crime victims and their families who have been affected by crimes committed by individuals under the investigative jurisdiction of ICE,” the Department of Homeland Security says on its website.
“I’ve had to hold the hand of too many mothers who lost a child to a DUI or somebody else who’s been raped by an illegal alien or someone with a nexus to immigration,” Barbara Gonzalez, the then-director of VOICE, said in October 2019. “It is a problem we cannot ignore as a country.”
The current administration plans to replace VOICE with The Victims Engagement and Services Line, which ICE called a “more comprehensive and inclusive victim support system” that will allow reports of crimes from anyone regardless of their immigration status. Read more…
