FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Thursday, December 16, 2021
Press Contact: Jessica Ortiz, [email protected]
“RAICES Responds to Reports of Low Family Detention Numbers: “Anyone claiming the Biden Administration has ‘ended family detention’ at this point is enabling dangerous propaganda””
“RAICES will not participate in the erasure of the separation, detention, and harm the Biden Administration continues to inflict upon Black and Brown families through its racist and white supremacist policies.”
San Antonio, TX – In response to the news that there are currently no migrant families in immigration detention, RAICES Supervising Attorney Javier Hidalgo issued the following statement:
“Anyone seeing this news and claiming the Biden Administration has ‘ended family detention’ at this point is enabling dangerous propaganda,” said Javier Hidalgo, RAICES Supervising Attorney. “We would love to see and celebrate the end of family detention, but unfortunately, this is not it.
“While currently there are no migrant families in detention centers, President Biden and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Mayorkas have made no official policy changes in regards to family detention or the Karnes and Dilley family prisons. That means DHS can bring families back into these facilities at any point, as they have done before,” continued Hidalgo. Over the past few years RAICES has seen multiple population changes at Karnes, from the facility detaining families to single adults and back to families again. Earlier this year media outlets reported that DHS stopped detaining families at Karnes, when in reality families were forced to return shortly thereafter. That’s why we fear the current removal of families in detention is only temporary.
“Right now, at best, we are seeing DHS fill the beds at family prisons with single adults, while they send many families back into fear and danger through the Biden Administration’s Title 42 and recently re-invoked Remain in Mexico policies.
“The reality is that the Biden administration is still separating families upon entering the U.S. It is still placing families in extreme danger through the cruel and racist ‘Migrant Protection Protocols’ and expelling families without due process under Title 42. DHS is still detaining families in hotels run by ICE contractors, and the Karnes and Dilley family prisons remain open to inflict the same trauma on people in detention as they have for years.
“RAICES will not participate in the erasure of the separation, detention, and harm the Biden Administration continues to inflict upon Black and Brown families through its racist and white supremacist policies,” concluded Hidalgo. “It’s time for President Biden to keep the promises he made to immigrant communities and shut down family detention for good.”
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The Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit agency that promotes justice by providing free and low-cost legal services to underserved immigrant children, families, and refugees. Learn more at raicestexas.org.
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