Help asylum seekers get justice: pol

Some are afraid, some just want to go home and others are ready to leave the U.S. for good.

But none of them know what their future holds.

Among the immigrant detainees being held in an upstate jail are a host of asylum seekers and others who have demonstrated a “credible fear” while being held for extended periods of time awaiting court proceedings or additional instructions, according to Queens Assemblyman David Weprin.

The Democratic lawmaker visited and met with immigrant detainees at the Albany County Jail earlier this week and will rally outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility in lower Manhattan Friday to call on the Trump administration to stop the inhumane practice.

Weprin said many of the roughly 270 detainees at the jail in Colonie, just outside of the state capital, were transferred from a detention facility on the southern border, near San Diego. Others had been living and working in the U.S. before being arrested. Some had entered the country through a port of entry and had already seen a judge. They are merely awaiting a decision on their asylum petition.

“The most disturbing thing is they are being treated as if they were convicted of major felonies,” said Weprin, who serves as chairman of the Assembly Correction Committee. “They're wearing jumpsuits and being housed in jail cells even though they are clearly not dangerous.”

Weprin wants ICE and the Department of Justice to expedite hearings for asylum seekers and raise the number of judges reviewing the cases.

He suggested adding an immigration court to the Albany area to make it easier for the attorneys representing the asylum seekers to make it to court.

An ICE spokeswoman declined to comment on the assemblyman's plan to rally on Friday.