DISMANTLING ORGANIZED CRIME: President Trump and the Department of Justice have aggressively confronted organized crime from street gangs to criminal cartels.
- In February, President Trump signed three Executive Orders – 13773, 13774, and 13776 – aimed at cracking down on international criminal organizations, including drug cartels and gangs, and preventing violence against law enforcement officers.
- Attorney General Sessions designated MS-13 as a priority for the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force, to allow our Federal law enforcement to utilize an expanded toolkit in its efforts to dismantle the organization.
- The United States, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras joined together to charge 3,800 MS-13 and 18th Street gang members in the United States and Central America, including the alleged leader of MS-13’s “East Coast Program.”
- The Department of Justice convicted eight members of an international criminal organization, known as the Rendon-Reyes Trafficking Organization, on Federal charges arising from their scheme to force young women and girls from Mexico and Latin America into prostitution.
RULE OF LAW IN OUR IMMIGRATION SYSTEM: President Trump has made the restoration of law and order in our immigration system a major priority of his Administration.
- The Trump Administration took action to wind down the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program following Attorney General Sessions’ assessment that DACA lacks legal authorization.
- If President Trump had allowed DACA to go to court, the program would likely have ended abruptly through a court-mandated injunction.
- President Trump’s action gives Congress the opportunity to consider appropriate legislative solutions, as required by our Constitution.
- The Department of Justice has improved administration of Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grants to increase information sharing on illegal aliens between Federal, State, and local law enforcement.
- At President Trump’s direction, the Department of Justice deployed more than 100 immigration judges to Department of Homeland Security detention facilities across the country, including along the southern border.
- Those judges completed 2,800 more cases than they would have completed at their home courts, helping address the immigration court backlog.
- The Department of Justice is supporting the State of Texas’s defense against a lawsuit seeking to block a state law that promotes information-sharing between localities and Federal immigration officials.
THE CRISIS NEXT DOOR: Under President Trump’s direction, the Department of Justice is combatting the opioid crisis and drug abuse.
- Attorney General Sessions announced the formation of the Opioid Fraud and Abuse Detection Unit, a new Department of Justice program to utilize data to help combat the devastating opioid crisis.
- The largest-ever health care fraud enforcement action was taken against medical professionals participating in healthcare fraud schemes, including distributing opioids and other dangerous narcotics, involving approximately $1.3 billion in false billings.
- Of the 412 charged defendants across 41 Federal districts, more than 120 defendants, including doctors, were charged for their roles in prescribing and distributing opioids and other dangerous narcotics.
- The Attorney General assigned 12 experienced Assistant United States Attorneys to opioid “hot-spots” for three-year terms to focus solely on investigating and prosecuting health care fraud related to prescription opioids.
- AlphaBay, the largest criminal marketplace on the Internet and used to sell illegal drugs, was seized by the Department of Justice.
- This Administration once again takes the threat of all illegal drugs seriously, and is developing additional strategies to tackle the illegal drug threat at home and abroad.
PARTNERING WITH LOCAL COMMUNITIES: President Donald J. Trump and the Department of Justice are working with local law enforcement to protect American communities.
- The Department of Justice announced more than $98 million in grant funding through the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services COPS Hiring Program to allow 802 additional full-time law enforcement officers.
- President Trump signed Executive Order 13809 to restore State and local law enforcement’s access to surplus equipment from the Defense Department such as armored vehicles.
- In June, Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the creation of the new National Public Safety Partnership, a cooperative initiative with cities to reduce violent crimes.
- Project Safe Neighborhoods was expanded under Attorney General Sessions to encourage U.S. Attorney’s to work with communities to develop customized crime reduction strategies.
- Attorney General Sessions returned to longstanding Department of Justice charging policy for our Federal prosecutors, trusting them once again and directing them to return to charging the most serious, readily provable offense.
- Prosecutors have been directed by the Department of Justice to focus on taking illegal guns off our streets. Criminals charged with unlawful possession of a firearm has increased 23 percent.
PROTECTING CIVIL RIGHTS: President Trump’s Administration is protecting the rights of all Americans.
- Under President Trump, the Department of Justice has supported students whose free-speech rights have been under attack on university campuses.
- The Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division is reviewing a complaint by a coalition of more than 60 Asian-American associations that alleges racial discrimination against Asian-Americans in Harvard University’s admission policy and practice.
- The Department of Justice secured a guilty plea for the first case prosecuted under the Hate Crimes Prevention Act involving a victim targeted because of gender identity.
