IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/policy/v56y2023i4d10.1007_s11077-023-09511-8.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Local implementation of U.S. federal immigration programs: context, control, and the problems of intergovernmental implementation

Author

Listed:
  • William D. Schreckhise

    (University of Arkansas)

  • Daniel E. Chand

    (Kent State University)

Abstract

Scholars contend that presidents exert some influence over the implementation of national policy. Yet, prior research has overlooked the importance of local context, specifically socio-political conditions, and how it can shape an agency’s response to executive-level guidance. We examine the effect of local context on county-level immigration removals by ICE agents from 2013 through 2018. We predict local removals starting with the Secure Communities program, continuing under Obama’s two-year Priority Enforcement Program (PEP), and up through Trump’s zero-tolerance policies. Obama-era executive guidance, which advised agents to target only dangerous criminal immigrants, did lead to a significant national decline in total removals. However, conservative localities continued to remove large numbers, even during PEP. Notably, the difference between conservative and liberal communities was largest for non-criminal immigrant removals. Despite Obama’s guidance to focus on dangerous immigrants, ICE agents continued to remove undocumented immigrants without criminal records from conservative U.S. counties. Our analysis indicates street-level agents are most responsive to chief-executive direction in the absence of local-level opposition to top-down demands.

Suggested Citation

  • William D. Schreckhise & Daniel E. Chand, 2023. "Local implementation of U.S. federal immigration programs: context, control, and the problems of intergovernmental implementation," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 56(4), pages 797-823, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:policy:v:56:y:2023:i:4:d:10.1007_s11077-023-09511-8
    DOI: 10.1007/s11077-023-09511-8
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11077-023-09511-8
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11077-023-09511-8?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jorge M. Chavez & Doris Marie Provine, 2009. "Race and the Response of State Legislatures to Unauthorized Immigrants," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 623(1), pages 78-92, May.
    2. Scholz, John T. & Twombly, Jim & Headrick, Barbara, 1991. "Street-Level Political Controls Over Federal Bureaucracy," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 85(3), pages 829-850, September.
    3. Hopkins, Daniel J., 2010. "Politicized Places: Explaining Where and When Immigrants Provoke Local Opposition," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 104(1), pages 40-60, February.
    4. Matthew C. Fellowes & Gretchen Rowe, 2004. "Politics and the New American Welfare States," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 48(2), pages 362-373, April.
    5. Scholz, John T. & Wei, Feng Heng, 1986. "Regulatory Enforcement in a Federalist System," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 80(4), pages 1249-1270, December.
    6. Joshua D. Clinton & Anthony Bertelli & Christian R. Grose & David E. Lewis & David C. Nixon, 2012. "Separated Powers in the United States: The Ideology of Agencies, Presidents, and Congress," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 56(2), pages 341-354, April.
    7. Moe, Terry M., 1985. "Control and Feedback in Economic Regulation: The Case of the NLRB," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 79(4), pages 1094-1116, December.
    8. Priscilla M. Regan & Christopher J. Deering, 2009. "State Opposition to REAL ID," Publius: The Journal of Federalism, CSF Associates Inc., vol. 39(3), pages 476-505, Summer.
    9. Regina Branton & Gavin Dillingham & Johanna Dunaway & Beth Miller, 2007. "Anglo Voting on Nativist Ballot Initiatives: The Partisan Impact of Spatial Proximity to the U.S.‐Mexico Border," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 88(3), pages 882-897, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Andrew B. Whitford, 2002. "Decentralization and Political Control of the Bureaucracy," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 14(2), pages 167-193, April.
    2. Faith Bradley & William D. Schreckhise & Daniel E. Chand, 2017. "Explaining States’ Responses to the REAL ID Act: the Role of Resources, Political Environment, and Implementor Attitudes in Complying with a Federal Mandate," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 8(3), pages 877-897, September.
    3. Jodi L. Short, 2021. "The politics of regulatory enforcement and compliance: Theorizing and operationalizing political influences," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 15(3), pages 653-685, July.
    4. Benjamin R. Knoll, 2013. "Implicit Nativist Attitudes, Social Desirability, and Immigration Policy Preferences," International Migration Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(1), pages 132-165, March.
    5. Nichole Gligor & David Gligor, 2021. "A roadmap to understanding restrictive immigration policy outcomes," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 102(4), pages 1830-1847, July.
    6. Wittels, Annabelle Sophie, 2020. "The effect of politician-constituent conflict on bureaucratic responsiveness under varying information frames," SocArXiv 4x8q2, Center for Open Science.
    7. Laura I. Langbein, 1994. "Estimating the Impact of Regulatory Program Enforcement," Evaluation Review, , vol. 18(5), pages 543-573, October.
    8. Sekeris, Petros & Vasilakis, Chrysovalantis, 2016. "The Mediterranean Refugees Crisis and Extreme Right Parties: Evidence from Greece," MPRA Paper 72222, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Jakub Lonsky, 2021. "Does immigration decrease far-right popularity? Evidence from Finnish municipalities," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 34(1), pages 97-139, January.
    10. Kokil Jaidka & Sean Fischer & Yphtach Lelkes & Yifei Wang, 2023. "News Nationalization in a Digital Age: An Examination of How Local Protests Are Covered and Curated Online," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 707(1), pages 189-207, May.
    11. Maciej Czaplewski, 2015. "Oddziaływanie regulacyjne Unii Europejskiej na rynek usług telekomunikacyjnych," Gospodarka Narodowa. The Polish Journal of Economics, Warsaw School of Economics, issue 5, pages 65-87.
    12. Jasjeet Singh Sekhon & Richard D. Grieve, 2012. "A matching method for improving covariate balance in cost‐effectiveness analyses," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 21(6), pages 695-714, June.
    13. Daniel P. Gitterman, 2013. "Remaking a Bargain: The Political Logic of the Minimum Wage in the United States," Poverty & Public Policy, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 5(1), pages 3-36, March.
    14. Kathryn Harrison, 1995. "Is cooperation the answer? Canadian environmental enforcement in comparative context," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 14(2), pages 221-244.
    15. Randall W. Bennett & Christine Loucks, 1996. "Politics And Length Of Time To Bank Failure: 1986–1990," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 14(4), pages 29-41, October.
    16. Keaton Miller & Boyoung Seo, 2021. "The Effect of Cannabis Legalization on Substance Demand and Tax Revenues," National Tax Journal, University of Chicago Press, vol. 74(1), pages 107-145.
    17. Sebastian Fietkau & Kasper M Hansen, 2018. "How perceptions of immigrants trigger feelings of economic and cultural threats in two welfare states," European Union Politics, , vol. 19(1), pages 119-139, March.
    18. Michael Greenberger, 2022. "Undoing reconstruction: Racial threat and the process of Redemption, 1870–1920," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 103(3), pages 649-669, May.
    19. Carlos Wing-Hung Lo & Gerald Erick Fryxell, 2005. "Governmental and Societal Support for Environmental Enforcement in China: An Empirical Study in Guangzhou," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 41(4), pages 558-588.
    20. Yolande Pottie-Sherman & Rima Wilkes, 2017. "Does Size Really Matter? On the Relationship between Immigrant Group Size and Anti-Immigrant Prejudice," International Migration Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 51(1), pages 218-250, March.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:policy:v:56:y:2023:i:4:d:10.1007_s11077-023-09511-8. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.