USPS joins federal task force to locate undocumented immigrants

MCALLEN, Texas (ValleyCentral) — The U.S. Postal Inspection Service, a law enforcement branch of the U.S. Postal Service, has joined efforts to use data from packages to locate undocumented immigrants.

In January, President Trump issued a directive to use all federal law enforcement resources to crack down on immigrants living in the United States illegally.

Pharr resident Frank De Hoyos says using the post office to help track down undocumented immigrants will lead to privacy concerns.

“It is bad that the postal service is already overworked and now you want to tasking them with another job that they shouldn’t be doing," De Hoyos said.

De Hoyos believes this will cause major privacy concerns.

“You have addresses and other means of following up, so in the longer run its going to invade a lot of privacy of innocent people. It is bad enough as people don’t need to be scrutinized anymore than they should, so basically it is not justified," De Hoyos said.

The Washington Post reported the Trump Administration will use the postal services' law enforcement arm to obtain photographs of envelopes and packages through its mail surveillance program.

“I believe it is a recipe for many people getting sync upon their normal everyday lives and just like that they are gone, and I don’t feel that is right," said Antonio S. Marines said.

McAllen resident J. R. Garcia also believes this is a problem.

“That is not the purpose of the post office," Garcia said. "The post office is to provide a service to the community not to be a detention center. I think it is an abuse.”

Immigration attorney Carlos Moctezuma Garcia calls the initiative aggressive. He says it will scare immigrant communities from using basic services.

He believes the postal program is already in place in the Valley.

“The probabilities are huge." Garcia said. "If somebody is using the postal service here in the Rio Grande Valley, and the government is interested in obtaining their information to try to figure out if they are undocumented in the country, then be prepared to see that happening.”

Garcia says this is because Trump's executive order mandates all agencies to work with immigration officials.

He says those likely most targeted with be immigrants who send money to another county or those using the mail to communicate with a loved one.

“The post office is going to be using their numbers, their data, their metrics, with immigration to try to determine who's in the country unlawfully, and perhaps their lead to an enforcement action against those people," Garcia said.

Garcia says privacy concerns are also not a tool to use against this policy.

“Courts are finding that that those concerns are not strong enough to overcome an executive order by the administration, and that it's okay, but obviously this affects communities, because the immigrant community is going to be devastated and perhaps not using these services any longer," the attorney added.

ValleyCentral contacted USPS and and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for comment.

Both did not respond to our request.