The Washington Post - 26.08.2019

MONDAY, AUGUST 26 , 2019. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ RE A

Politics & the Nation

BY MARIA SACCHETTI

dilley, tex. — More than a year
after he drew criticism for com-
paring family detention to a
“summer camp,” the nation’s top
immigration enforcer stood in a
clean hallway in America’s larg-
est family detention complex and
gestured around himself.
“Take a look,” said Matthew
Albence, U.S. Immigration and
Customs Enforcement’s acting
director.
Across the hall was a dental
office, with a reclining chair and
sterile instruments. The cafeteria
was serving hot dogs, lime-cilan-
tro chicken, tortillas and green
salad — all you can eat. Kinder-
gartners sat on a colorful mat in a
schoolhouse trailer and learned
to sing “If You’re Happy and You
Know It.”
ICE allowed news photogra-
phers and television cameras
into the family residential center
on Friday because, they said,
some news reports and members
of Congress have confused the
Border Patrol’s cramped, short-
term jails — criticized by immi-
gration attorneys and Democrat-
ic lawmakers for their “horren-
dous” conditions — with the
comprehensive family detention
centers that ICE is attempting to
expand.
Albence and other officials led
the tour on the same day the
Trump administration officially
moved to terminate a court
agreement that sets basic stan-
dards for the care of underage
migrants, including a 20-day lim-
it on their detention. The admin-
istration says withdrawing from
the Flores Settlement Agree-
ment, in place since 1997, would
not mean families would be de-
tained indefinitely. Officials said
they hope to hold them no longer
than 50 to 60 days, enough time
to deport those who are ineligible

for asylum and release the rest.

That would triple the length of

time children are held, and ap-

peals could take longer.

The South Texas Family Resi-

dential Center sits off a vast

stretch of scrubland in a tiny

former oil-boom town, an hour

south of San Antonio. There’s a

Dairy Queen, a motel named

White House Inn and not much

else. CoreCivic, a private for-prof-

it company that specializes in

corrections and runs adult immi-

gration jails, also runs the center.

The Dilley facility is one of

three family detention centers in

the United States, with a total

capacity of about 3,000 beds,

though only two are in use.

Approximately 900 parents and

children were being held in Dil-

ley and another facility in Penn-

sylvania as of last week.

Albence said that, unlike the

Border Patrol facilities where

children lacked toothbrushes

and were photographed sleeping

on the ground, ICE’s family resi-

dential centers give children and

parents three hot meals a day

and access to a wide array of

services, including a 24-hour in-

firmary, a day care, a library with

Internet and email access, a

beauty salon, a charter school

and a canteen. Officials allowed a

photographer to access the in-

side of the facility in 2015.

Mothers and children as

young as babies sleep in dorms

with bunk beds and share bath-

rooms, with trailers divided into

neighborhoods with names such

as Green Turtle and Yellow Frog.

“This is clearly not a concen-

tration camp,” Albence said, re-

ferring to the “ugly rhetoric” that

some activists have directed at

ICE agents in recent months.

Pediatricians, child psychia-

trists, immigration lawyers, con-

gressional Democrats and others

swiftly condemned the move to

end Flores, and lawyers vowed to

oppose the withdrawal in court.

Advocates for immigrants say

detaining children with hun-

dreds of strangers is dangerous.

Chickenpox, the flu and other

diseases can spread quickly. Chil-

dren and parents grow stressed,

and some become suicidal.

The mother of a 19-month-old

girl who fell ill at Dilley and died

shortly after her release last year

has filed a wrongful-death claim

saying the girl, Mariee, was vom-

iting constantly and neglected at

Dilley.

“Detention for any length of

time, with or without their fami-

lies, is bad for children,” said

Caryl Stern, president and chief

executive of UNICEF USA, the

United Nations agency that advo-

cates for women and children in

the United States, in a statement.

“The proof is there. Detained

children experience long-lasting

harm on their well-being, safety,

and development.”

Before the rule can take effect,

officials say it must go before U.S.

District Judge Dolly M. Gee, an

Obama appointee in Los Angeles,

and lawyers for both sides are

scheduled to file briefs in the

coming days.

Officials said that Dilley is not

a secure facility and that women

and children are free to wander

around the campus. But if fami-

lies try to leave, officials said,

they could be apprehended for

being in the United States illegal-

ly. ICE did not allow reporters to

speak with the women and chil-

dren held in Dilley on Friday.

But in interviews Thursday at

a San Antonio bus station an

hour north of Dilley, women

recently released from the facili-

ty and heading to join friends

and relatives in Miami, Dallas

and other cities, said they were

treated well. The food was tasty,

they said, and they appreciated

access to doctors and lawyers.

Dilley was far better than the

Border Patrol holding cells, they

said, or the safe houses they

stayed in during their trip

through Mexico.

Still, the women said, they

considered Dilley a jail.

A tall fence surrounds it;

guards keep watch. Women and

children wear name tags

stamped with the CoreCivic logo.

“We didn’t suffer. But we were

locked up,” said Lillian, a 29-

year-old woman who spoke on

the condition that her last name

not be used because she was

afraid to speak publicly, in part

because she said she had fled

gang members attempting to ex-

tort her in Honduras. “For me, it

was being locked up. You want to

work, to go out. But you’re locked

up.”

Dilley’s guards — not parents

— set the rules: Children cannot

run barefoot, officials said.

“Mothers must not leave their

children alone in any moment,”

not even to go to the bathroom,

said signs posted in a dorm room.

If children color on walls or

furniture, another rule said, “a

disciplinary report will be pro-

duced.”

Everyone has to make their

bed, fold their clothes and place

their shoes against the wall or

under the bed. Officials reward

migrants with prizes for the

“cleanest room.”

Officials said the rules are for

the families’ health and safety.

But advocates say it traumatizes

children when their parents are

not in charge.

Mirian, a 25-year-old mother

of three children — 11, 7 and

nearly 2 years old — said she

struggled to sleep at Dilley. The

Honduran native had to monitor

each child constantly and wor-

ried about being deported or the

children falling ill.

“I didn’t know if I’d ever get

out,” she said, speaking on the

condition that her last name not

be used because of privacy con-

cerns.

Migrant family residential

centers expanded under the

Obama administration to hold

rapidly growing numbers of Cen-

tral American families crossing

the U.S. southern border with

Mexico to seek asylum. Because

of the 20-day limit on detaining

children, officials say they have

been forced to release most fami-

lies in the United States to await

an immigration hearing and

many disappear.

Officials say expanding family

detention under the Obama ad-

ministration created a deterrent

that led to a marked drop in

apprehensions, from 68,

family members in 2014 to nearly

40,000 the following year.

But Gee ruled in 2015 that the

government could not hold chil-

dren with their parents longer

than 20 days in facilities that had

not been licensed by states — a

decision officials blame for a

record spike in crossings, more

than 400,000 this fiscal year.

Gee ruled last year that “any

number of other factors could

have caused the increase in ille-

gal border crossings, including

civil strife, economic degrada-

tion, and fear of death in the

migrants’ home countries.”

Trump administration offi-

cials say they are confident that

detaining families can resolve

the immigration cases quickly

and combat smugglers’ claims in

Central America that it is easy to

enter the United States if mi-

grants travel with a child.

[email protected]

With detention rules in question, ICE lets media in facility

JABIN BOTSFORD/THE WASHINGTON POST

A child plays at the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley. Immigrants at ICE residential

centers get three hot meals a day and have access to an array of services, said ICE’s acting director.

Tour of family residential

center comes amid effort

to terminate agreement

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