Immigration detention is no ‘holiday’

In his recent op-ed, “Alleged illegal and criminal immigrants should not be taxpayer-supported guests,” Rep. Lamar Smith gets several things wrong.  While attacking the newest detention facility opened by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Rep. Smith complains that the facility’s cost was “[over] $30 million taxpayer dollars.”

To quote Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, “Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.” Rep. Smith’s claim is completely false. The $32 million facility was built at the expense of the Geo Group, Inc., a private prison company that no doubt expects to make a profit on the venture. The facility, with grim bunk beds eight to a room and prison-like walls is far from plush (to see pictures, click here). The actual cost to taxpayers of holding detainees at this facility is about half as much, on average, as at other facilities. The truth is this facility actually saves taxpayer money.

Rep. Smith has been wrong on this point before. At Wednesday’s Immigration Subcommittee detention standards hearing derisively entitled, “Holiday on ICE,” Rep. Smith made this claim even though his own witness testified correctly that taxpayers did not fund the construction.

It is well established that immigrants in detention have long been at risk of sexual violence. The National Prison Rape Elimination Commission, formed pursuant to the bipartisan Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003, called for “special interventions” to protect civil immigration detainees from abuse.

To its credit, this administration came in and admitted that the system was broken. A fundamental change was necessary to prevent suffering and death and to make immigration detention suitable for its civil population.

We are still a long way from fixing all of the problems with our immigration detention system. Rep. Smith is correct that “[the] United States prides itself on treating people with the utmost respect and dignity.” That just makes it all the more difficult to understand why Republicans insist on addressing this issue in a disrespectful and undignified manner.

Throughout this Congress, opponents of sensible immigration reform that works for America’s economy and American families have argued for the deportation of 11 million immigrants living in our communities. But after Wednesday’s “Holiday on ICE” hearing, you can’t help but wonder if there aren’t some in Congress who feel it is not enough to deport 11 million people—they also want them to suffer and remain vulnerable to sexual assault and death.

Rep. Lofgren (D-Calif.) is the ranking member on the Subcommittee on Immigration Policy and Enforcement.

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