The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has named Michelle Brane the agency’s new immigration detention ombudsman, a move that has drawn criticism from former Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials. Brane, who previously served as the executive director for the department’s Family Reunification Task Force, has harshly criticized ICE’s detention practices.
The Biden administration’s new pick to find criticisms for detaining illegal migrants dislikes her agency so much that she’s called for its funding to be cut despite the waves of unregulated migrants pouring in across the border day after day, year after year.
Brane accused ICE in several posts on X, formerly Twitter, of using “abusive enforcement” and stated that the agency “can not implement detention humanely.” She called for the use of alternatives to detention and urged the agency to “stop using a prison model for civil immigration cases.”
Former ICE chief of staff Jon Feere who served in the Trump administration told the New York Post that appointing Brané to this position is like “putting an arsonist in charge of conducting oversight of the U.S. Forest Service.” Feere expressed concern that Brané may use her new authority to undermine ICE’s detention efforts through excessive audits and the release of illegal aliens based on unsupported and phony complaints.
Former ICE field office director John Fabbricatore has similar sentiments, telling the Post that the decision DHS made to appoint Brane “raises critical questions about the direction and priorities of ICE under the current administration.” Fabbricatore pointed to Brané’s previous assertions that ICE’s efforts to pre-emptively arrest illegal aliens to prevent further crimes equate to a “police state” as evidence of serious issues for someone holding a significant position in immigration enforcement.
ICE director "We shouldn't wait for them to become a criminal" – sounds like a police state to mehttps://t.co/glfLpBdAUc via @HuffPostPol
— Michelle Brané (@MichelleBrane) June 14, 2017
Brane’s criticism of ICE extends back to the Trump administration. She claimed in 2020 that the former president’s DHS separated migrant children from their parents, stating, “Yet again – the cruelty of this administration and border policies that punish those seeking protection is shocking. Separating newborns from their mother and lying about hospital policy.”
The new appointment comes at a time when the Biden administration has heavily relied on its “Alternatives to Detention” program that keeps migrants from being physically detained for long periods of time as they await court dates to hear their asylum claims. But many of these released illegal migrants disappear into the country and never show up to their court date.
In her new role as immigration detention ombudsman Brané will be responsible for scrutinizing ICE’s detention of illegal migrants. Her past comments — and the fact that she was nominated by the Biden administration at all — are obvious signs of fervent bias and a red flag for hopes of getting the immigration crisis under control before November’s elections.
