The Department of Homeland Security is investigating agency practices on the handling of migrants' personal property amid reports that some documents were confiscated by Border Patrol at the southern border and not returned, CBS News reported.
Migrants told CBS' "60 Minutes" that U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials along the U.S.-Mexico border kept their documents — including passports and birth certificates — despite DHS policy instructing agents to return migrants' personal property unless it is fraudulent.
"CBP and [U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement] are reviewing their policies and practices to ensure that, once a migrant is released from their custody, their documents are returned to the migrant absent a security or law enforcement reason," DHS said in a statement to CBS News.
"60 Minutes" reported Sunday that that all but four of 16 recently interviewed Venezuelan migrants said Border Patrol did not return personal documents before releasing them.
Attorneys, case workers, and volunteers who have spoken to migrants told "60 Minutes" that the problem is widespread.
Democrat lawmakers including Reps. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss.; Joaquin Castro, D-Texas; Raúl Grijalva, D-Ariz.; and Nanette Barragán, D-Calif., asked Congress' investigative arm, the Government Accountability Office (GAO), to "conduct a review" of CBP's "activities, policies, and procedures regarding the handling of personal property belonging to individuals in its custody."
"Media outlets and other organizations have reported concerns about Border Patrol agents confiscating asylum seekers' religious headwear as well as not returning or improperly discarding personal property belonging to apprehended individuals along the southwest border," the lawmakers said in a Friday letter to GAO Comptroller General Gene Dodaro.
In August, the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona alleged that Border Patrol agents in Arizona are confiscating the turbans of Sikh men seeking asylum and throwing their headwear into the trash.
CBS News reported that CBP employs a 2015 policy that calls for the migrants' personal property to be "safeguarded" if it is determined not to be contraband. Agents are instructed to "make every effort" to transfer the confiscated property — unless documents are deemed to be fraudulent — with detainees when they are transferred, deported, or released.
A Venezuelan migrant who crossed the border earlier this year told "60 Minutes" that Border Patrol agents kept several of her family's personal documents, including their passports, ID cards, her children's birth certificates, and her husband's driver’s license.
"Immigration took them from me," said Beberlyn, a 33-year-old living in a New York City shelter with her husband, 15-year-old nephew, 12-year-old son, and 4-year-old daughter.
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