The Biden government is moving forward with plans to decrease the long-term detention of migrant families, according to documents filed on Friday in federal court, although advocates fear that the change in policy will not be permanent.
The Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) oversees three detention centers designed to keep migrant parents and children in deportation proceedings: two facilities in Texas operated by prison for-profit companies and a smaller one run by officials in Berks County, Pennsylvania. Collectively, the facility has beds for more than 3,300 parents and children, but the Biden government’s new plan would discontinue its use as long-term family detention centers – at least temporarily.
In documents filed with the US district court in Los Angeles, the ICE said it was planning to convert the family detention center in Berks County into an adults-only facility. The ICE also announced that Texas detention centers in Dilley and Karnes City will transition to short-term processing facilities designed to keep migrant families for less than three days.
Legal service providers representing migrant parents and children detained in these facilities said that all of their clients have been released in the past few days, but the groups have yet to receive any guidance as to why.
On Friday, the ICE said that only 13 families remained in detention earlier this week, noting that all were scheduled to be released on Sunday, provided the test was negative for the coronavirus.
“ICE would like to note that it is reviewing its current family detention stance at (family detention facilities) to allow for a wider reuse of physical facilities to better meet operational needs,” the agency said in its judicial process.
ICE did not respond to requests for comment on Friday’s court files. The plan to convert Texas family detention centers into rapid processing facilities was first reported by the San Antonio Express-News.
Andrea Meza, an immigration lawyer at the Center for Education and Legal Services for Refugees and Immigrants, the main provider of legal services for detained families at the Karnes City unit, expressed concern that the Biden government’s plans might not be durable.
“The changes in Karnes and Dilley’s family prisons are, at best, reversible operational changes that reduce the damage from long-term detention and, at worst, a temporary move to quell concern over this controversial immigration policy that will be undone with anti-immigrant political pressure, “Meza told CBS News, referring to the detention of family members.
Meza also criticized the United States government for continuing to use a public health authority invoked by the Trump administration last spring to quickly expel most adults and migrant families to Mexico or their countries of origin, without giving them the opportunity to seek humanitarian refuge.
Although it has protected unaccompanied minors from rapid evictions, the Biden government has said repeatedly that it will maintain the policy, known as Title 42, of continuing to expel most border crossers until it can expand the government’s ability to prosecute asylum seekers. Some families with young children have been released in southern Texas, where local authorities are testing the coronavirus.
In January, US officials along the southern border took more than 7,400 parents and children into custody – an increase of 60% over December. More than 4,700 of them were expelled under the Trump era public health order, according to government data.
Defenders have long called for an end to detention for family immigration, which child welfare experts have concluded is harmful to minors and their psychological well-being. A 2016 report commissioned by the Department of Homeland Security called for the practice to be discontinued.
The Obama administration dramatically expanded the detention of parents and children in 2014, when there was a sharp increase in the number of Central American families who entered custody at the United States’ border. The two current Texas family detention facilities started to maintain families that year.
In response to a lawsuit filed by lawyers for detained young immigrants, US District Judge Dolly Gee ruled in 2015 that children detained with their parents were also entitled to legal safeguards under the 1997 Flower Resolution Agreement, which requires the government work for the release of minors in your custody.
Gee also determined that minors should generally not be kept for more than 20 days in secure facilities that are not licensed by the states to house children. None of the three ICE family detention centers currently have licenses from state authorities that certify that the facility can care for children.
The Trump administration sought to detain migrant families during their asylum cases, proposing a rule in 2019 that would have revoked the Flores agreement and allowed the government to detain parents and children indefinitely. Gee blocked the effect of the regulation.
President Biden’s campaign promised to use alternative arrangements that would not require the detention of migrants, including expanding case management programs designed to ensure that asylum seekers attend their court appointments. Mr. Biden also called for children and parents to be released from ICE detention together last summer.
Bridget Cambria, executive director of Aldea – The People’s Justice Center, which has assisted families in Berks County detention center, said the Biden administration should not be in the business of detaining parents and children, even for short periods of time.
“You cannot continue to use the facilities that used to punish families, because there is always a fear of returning,” Cambria told CBS News. “The facilities, all three, are safe and unlicensed detention facilities, so you should question their use for any period of time.”