ICE Admits to Detaining Pregnant Women in El Paso Processing Center
The National Immigrant Youth Alliance, the organization whose membership has literally put their bodies on the line to highlight our nation's unjust immigration system, recently revealed new and even more upsetting conditions immigrants are current living under in US detention. Organizers who intentionally allowed themselves to be detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to gain access to the El Paso Processing Center identified up to 13 pregnant women detained in the center between August and November of 2013. In conjunction with the NIYA, Fusion has also reported as a part of their on-going investigation that one of the women suffered from a miscarriage while detained.
While ICE policy states that detaining pregnant or nursing women is low on their priority list, having 13 women in detention within a four month period says otherwise. Agents require special permission from field office directors to detain pregnant women. Their directive states that resources should be spent on top priority cases such as those who have previously broken immigration laws, those who are threats to public safety, or those who have been convicted of crimes.
Santiago Garcia-Leco, an undocumented activist with the NIYA, infiltrated the processing center last month. He helped uncover the stories of the pregnant women, as well as nearly 100 instances of ICE officials refusing to release parole eligible individuals. In response, the NIYA has launched a petition asking that Washington DC ICE officials initiate a full review of the entire facility.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) says pregnant women shouldn't be detained in their facilities "absent extraordinary circumstances." ICE spokespeople, who originally denied any miscarriage from occurring, have come out more recently to say the woman's "condition occurred independently of circumstances of her confinement." Advocates have emphasized that inadequate medical care in dentition poses as a threat to the well being of women and unborn children.
More at http://www.burntorangereport.com/diary/14659/ice-admits-to-detaining-pregnant-women-in-el-paso-processing-center .