Rep. Calvert Praises Increase In Funding For Incarceration Of Criminal Aliens

Press Release

Rep. Calvert, who led the effort to increase funding for the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program (SCAAP), was pleased that the amendment increasing funding to $400 million was accepted by voice vote late last night by the House. SCAAP is managed by the Department of Justice and is a program that reimburses state and local law enforcement for the costs of incarcerating criminal aliens.

"I was pleased to work with Chairman Mollohan, and others, to find the appropriate offset in the FY2010 Commerce, Justice, Science Appropriations bill so that we could provide a $100 million increase to SCAAP," said Rep. Calvert who offered a similar amendment during committee mark up of the bill but was defeated. "Illegal immigration is a federal responsibility and we cannot continue to ask more of our local law enforcement communities without providing the necessary resources."

A recent GAO report found that local law enforcement only receive a partial reimbursement through SCAAP: states spend more than $1.7 billion each year to incarcerate criminal aliens, and Congress has only reimbursed about 20 percent of these local expenditures over the years. Riverside County only received about 17% reimbursement for the cost of incarcerating criminal aliens in Fiscal Years 08-09. Of the 65,000 inmates booked each year at Orange County jails, approximately 19% are criminal aliens.

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