Nearly 60 percent of illegal immigrants identified by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement as criminal threats are not deported and are eventually released, the latest example of the Obama administration's failed immigration policy.

Internal ICE figures show that in fiscal 2015, the agency encountered 152,393 illegal immigrants labeled a criminal threat, mostly in jails, but charged 64,116. About another 88,000 were not processed for deportation, according to the Center for Immigration Studies' Jessica Vaughan.

The numbers are even worse for those who ICE asks local police and sheriffs to detain but never collect.

Under Obama's recently announced Priority Enforcement Program, officials work with local police to arrest and deport criminal immigrants. In reality, that amounts to a phone call from ICE requesting local authorities hold the suspect for 48 hours after they're set to be freed.

But several sheriffs from around the country say that just 35-40 percent of those held are ever seized by ICE, even after they've been released.

Richard W. Stanek, sheriff of Hennepin County in Minneapolis, said he had 75 illegals ICE wanted, but the agency only picked up about 35 percent. "And these are people that they want," he told the Washington Examiner.

Susan Benton, sheriff of Florida's Highlands County, said "mine would be much much lower." Worse, she added, many are seized and sent to a federal facility in Miami and immediately released and return to her county.

It's become a huge issue for local police. Benton said she wants to help ICE and hold illegal immigrants longer, but can't legally. Often the result is more crime from the suspect and questions about why her department's jail frees them.

"We're the bad guys, we're the ones CNN is on saying, 'That sheriff left that killer out.'"

David J. Mahoney, sheriff of Dane County in Madison, Wis., said departments are less likely to comply with ICE requests because of the legal issues and a lack of support from the federal government.

"It's kind of a, 'Do me a favor and hold them for 48 hours or more.' When in fact there is no legal standing to do that. ICE says 'hold 'em, but we won't defend you if you get sued.'"

Liberal Democrat warns TPP could end auto industry

The controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal between the U.S. and 11 other nations could spark a new wave of U.S. auto and auto parts makers fleeing to Mexico, a leading Democratic trade expert in the House is warning.

According to Michigan Rep. Sandy Levin, the result would be that Americans eventually may be forced to buy "TPP cars or trucks," assembled in Mexico and largely made of Chinese parts.

Levin, the top Democrat on the House Ways and Means Committee, came out in opposition to the deal last week. He said it includes no demands that Mexico let workers unionize or that it increase automaker wages above the $8-an-hour average.

His worry is that many more automakers will flee to cheaper Mexico, one of the countries in the trade pact. Levin said one Detroit company told him that closing a U.S. plant saves $300 million.

He's also upset that the Obama trade deal would open the door to China flooding the car parts industry, resulting in cars built in Mexico with mostly Chinese parts, which are cheaper. The U.S. is the biggest importer of Mexican-made cars.

If the deal succeeds, Levin said every car from Mexico should come with this notice: "This model comes with job loss as standard equipment."

Wage gap: 'Average' CEO salary less than one Hillary speech

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton's charge that corporate CEOs earn 300 times more than their workers isn't just wrong. It hides another very real wage gap: She earns more in just one speech than the average American CEO in a year.

Mark J. Perry, a University of Michigan professor and author of the American Enterprise Institute's popular Carpe Diem blog, did the fact-checking of Clinton's numbers and came up with that result.

The average CEO, using Bureau of Labor Statistics figures, makes $216,100. On the stump, Clinton's agent, the Harry Walker Agency Inc., charged $275,000 a speech and packaged three for Wall Street's Goldman Sachs at $675,000.

Perry used the BLS average salary for all CEOs, not just the top ones Clinton likes to cite. He also found that the average worker salary is $48,920, about what it was in 2009. That translates into an apples-to-apples wage gap of 4.4-to-1.

Paul Bedard, the Washington Examiner's "Washington Secrets" columnist, can be contacted at pbedard@washingtonexaminer.com.