Gillibrand pushes to require record-keeping by immigration agents

Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (N.Y.) announced Friday new legislation aimed at holding border patrol and customs enforcement agents accountable for questioning the immigration status of train and bus passengers. 

The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Digital Accountability and Transparency Act (DATA), would mandate that officers with Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement formally maintain records of each time they question a passenger. 

“Keeping our country safe cannot come at a cost to basic human rights. When border patrol agents stop and question people in New York and in many places across the country, they aren’t keeping data about why they targeted a particular person or what happened during their encounter,” Gillibrand said in a statement Friday. 

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DATA would also require border and immigration agents to log detailed information on patrol stops made outside of international security checkpoints, as Gillibrand cited the agencies’ broad authority to check vehicles within the vast 100-mile U.S. border zones.

The DHS would then have to log the information, including the reason for the stop and whether force was used, in a database accessible to the public. 

The bill, co-sponsored by Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Tom Udall (D-N.M.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), has drawn the support of liberal civil rights and immigration advocacy groups such as the ACLU and the Southern Border Coalition at a time when the Trump administration is taking an aggressive approach to immigration enforcement.

Social media has been flooded in recent months with videos and stories of random checks where travelers are quizzed about their immigration status.

President Trump last month authorized the National Guard, at the recommendation of the DHS, to aid in border security along the U.S.-Mexico border.