In a stunning admission before a House Committee panel on Tuesday, DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson admitted that the Obama Administration has been artificially inflating deportation numbers. While the administration has claimed a "record number" of deportations, earning Pres. Obama the nickname "Deporter in Chief", Johnson admitted that they have been counting border apprehensions that are turned over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers as deportations.

During a House Appropriations Committee hearing, Rep. John Culberson (R-Texas) said to Johnson, "Under the Obama administration, more than half of those removals that were attributed to ICE are actually a result of Border Patrol arrests that wouldn't have been counted in prior administrations."

Johnson responded, "Correct."

Jessica Vaughan, the Director of Policy Studies at the Center for Immigration Studies, has been arguing that actual deportations have declined under Pres. Obama. In her research, she says that if you count all removals, including those done by ICE and Border Patrol, then the Obama administration averages 800,000 removals per year. In comparison, George W. Bush would have removed more than 1.3 million illegal aliens per year, and Bill Clinton would have removed more than 1.5 million per year.

Vaughan also found that if you examine deportations from enforcement efforts by ICE, the number declined by 19 percent between 2011 and 2012 and was on track to decline another 22 percent in 2013. Further, the total number of deportations in 2011 was the lowest level since 1973.

For more information, see the Washington Times.