Incompetence du joure

[timelets]

Cato Institute did their homework on the economics of border enforcement:

ISAP II data in 2012, the last year for which data is reliably available, showed that 17,524 people left the program. Of those, 4.9 percent absconded and 4 percent were arrested by other law enforcement agencies. The other 91.1 percent complied with their court orders and either left the country or earned some sort of legal status. Appearance rates at immigration courts were 99.6 percent.
...
The Family Placement Alternatives run by the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services (LIRS) began accepting immigrants from ICE detention in June 2013. They achieved a 97 percent appearance rate in immigration court and only cost an average of $24 a day. The per-family cost of this is $50 per day according to a 2015 pilot program, much cheaper than the estimated detention cost of $798 per family.

https://www.cato.org/blog/alternatives-detention-are-cheaper-indefinite-detention

via marginalrevolution.

Zero-tolerance is designed to score political points, not to address the immigration problem.