Lawmakers urge Senate committee to slash ballooned immigration enforcement and detention funds
Source: dailykos
Monday July 12, 2021 · 12:25 PM CDT
?1608061901
Senators Robert Menendez and Alex Padilla lead a group of nearly a dozen Senate Democrats in calling on the chamber’s appropriations committee to decrease funds going to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for immigration enforcement and detention in the next fiscal year. The Biden administration’s first full budget request called for no overall reductions for Customs and Border Protection (CBP) or Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the latter of which is seeing another needless surge in COVID-19 cases.
“As the administration uses its executive action to begin the long process of rebuilding the United States’ immigration system, the government’s ability to realize its vision of a more humane and just immigration system relies on Congress utilizing the appropriations process to take bold action,” the letter states. Other letter signatories including Senators Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Mazie Hirono, Ed Markey, Jeff Merkley, Tammy Duckworth, Richard Blumenthal, Cory Booker, and Tammy Baldwin.
“First, ICE has rapidly expanded the immigration detention system, which now sprawls across more than 200 private prisons, county jails, and detention centers,” senators write to the Senate Committee on Appropriations and the Subcommittee on Homeland Security Committee on Appropriations. “This massive expenditure of taxpayer dollars is excessive and unnecessary.” Contrary to right-wing lies, most immigrants show up to court, and historically low detention numbers during the pandemic showed that ICE can perfectly well let people pursue their cases from their homes. Instead of building up ICE, there should be investments in humane alternatives that keep people out of detention.
Yet, ICE is again detaining huge numbers of immigrants, nearly double from April. And as the detention numbers have risen, so have the infections. This was completely preventable. “Moreover, as of May 7, 2021, ICE still had no clear plan to secure COVID-19 vaccines or provide vaccines for individuals in custody in detention centers,” legislators said. “In addition, ICE continues to face scrutiny for medical neglect in immigration detention, and ICE has not implemented an effective case review process for the people in detention at grave risk in detention.”..........................................
Read more: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2021/7/12/2039387/-Lawmakers-urge-Senate-appropriations-committee-to-slash-immigration-enforcement-and-detention-funds
?1608061901
Relatives of detained individuals attend a press conference calling on Congress to cut funding for US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and to defund border detention facilities, outside the US Capitol in Washington, DC, February 7, 2019. (Photo by SAUL LOEB / AFP) (Photo credit should read SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images)