Acting ICE Director Matthew Albence says that up to 13,000 criminal illegal aliens have been released into the country due to the actions of “sanctuary” cities and counties, as The Epoch Times reports.

This comes after ICE reported that it had successfully deported over 267,000 illegal aliens along the border in the year 2019. However, resources for interior enforcement of immigration laws were depleted due to the crisis on the border, thus decreasing ICE’s rate of arresting convicted illegals by about 13,000 compared to 2018.

“What that means,” Albence explained, “is there’s 13,000 more criminals that we could’ve gotten our hands on, could have got off the street, that are still out there and able to reoffend.”

Of those criminal illegals who were arrested by ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) in 2019, a total of 489,000 crimes were committed collectively by the 123,000 individual illegal aliens, thus equating to a rate of “four criminal arrests or convictions per alien.” Thus, the 13,000 who were released account for at least 52,000 crimes that have already been committed, and each one is capable of committing an additional four crimes now that they are released.