The FBI and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) have introduced new task forces cracking down on foreign gangs operating in the United States, the FBI said in a statement released on Oct. 24.
“These new teams, known as Homeland Security Task Forces, bring together FBI and HSI personnel—as well as task force officers from local, state, and federal partner agencies—to investigate transnational organized crime activity such as drug trafficking and human trafficking that occurs across all 50 states, the nation’s capital, and Puerto Rico,” the agency said.
According to the FBI, the task force is focused on “rooting out violent crime committed by foreign gangs, cartels, and other transnational criminal organizations impacting the United States.”
In an Aug. 8 statement, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said it had arrested 356 gang members in the first six months of the Trump administration, who combined had been convicted of nearly 1,700 criminal offenses and had entered the United States illegally more than 1,400 times.
Arrested individuals included convicted murderers, thieves, child predators, and arsonists, the agency said. One individual was found to have illegally entered the country 40 times.
In total, members from 40 different gangs were arrested, including 39 individuals from the Salvadoran gang MS-13 and 25 from Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua gang.
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