OPINION: Immigrants should be freed from detention centers.
As health experts warn the public to practice social distancing and wear protective gear, and our economy grinds to a halt to avoid the continued spread of coronavirus, immigrants in detention are routinely denied any personal protective equipment and proper access to hygienic products.
Guards who go in and out of these facilities are also not given proper protective equipment, posing a dire risk of infection for detainees who are essentially in what could be considered a death trap under the current conditions.
To reduce the risk of COVID-1 spreading among detainees and guards, federal immigration authorities should immediately release the detainees to their loved ones. It’s the moral and right thing to do.
Delaying release will only worsen the situation for those inside these detention centers and their anxious family members, who are fighting to get them freed.
One detainee left Cuba and gave himself to border patrol at the southern border after being robbed and losing his belongings in Mexico. His asylum case was derailed due to losing his documents during that robbery. Since then, he has been transferred to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention centers in Texas, Mississippi, Louisiana, and finally at the Baker County ICE facility in Florida. He’s been held since May 2019.
Complicating the situation for the detainee is the fact that he suffers from asthma. He and other detainees are not given gloves, masks or anything to protect themselves from exposure to COVID-19, his wife Annette told me. She, like others I interviewed, did not want her last name used.
“My husband and the other people in detention don’t get anything, they supply their own soap and they have to share rolls of toilet paper among each other,” Annette said.
The guards also don’t wear gloves and masks, even while handling their food, which puts the detainees at risk on a daily basis, according to Annette.
She said her husband and others were put in a cold empty room commonly referred to as a “hielera” – the Spanish word for icebox — while being transferred from the Krome detention facility to one in Baker County.
In another case, a 45-year-old detainee from Cuba with a respiratory illness got laryngitis and was quarantined while being transferred to an ICE detention center in Alexandria, Louisiana. He was later sent to the Krome Detention Center, where no beds were available for recent arrivals. He spent seven days sleeping on the floor in a bunker-style room with dozens of others until he was sent to the Baker County Detention Center.
At Baker, he was also placed in the hielera for two days without a shower. He was only given Ibuprofen for his worsening laryngitis. It took three days for detention officials to give soap to those detained and none have received any sort of protective equipment to help shield them from exposure to COVID-19.
Detainees at Baker are cut off from their loved ones. Calls within Florida cost $2 for the first two minutes and 38 cents for each additional minute. And only three phones are available for 29 detainees.
“I feel like they are condemning my husband to death in the midst of this pandemic,” his wife, Damaris, told me.
Organizations like United We Dream and the Broward-based Circle of Protection, say they can hardly keep up with the amount of requests for help they receive.
Another detainee’s spouse worries that her husband, who has asthma and epilepsy, is at risk of dying if he contracts the deadly disease.
“We are afraid if he remains in detention, his health problems will put him at high risk and he won’t survive if he gets coronavirus,” Dailin told me. “Our five-year-old daughter asks us every day when her dad is coming back. She asks if we can count with fingers the days left.”
Last week, immigrant detainees got some promising news. A Miami federal magistrate judge recommended that U.S immigration officials “substantially” reduce detainee populations at three South Florida detention centers, the Miami Herald reported. The magistrate judge cites conditions that amount to “cruel and unusual punishment” and said ICE has acted with “deliberate indifference” when caring for detainees.
Unfortunately, hopes were dashed on Tuesday when U.S. District Judge Marcia G. Cooke allowed the transfer of detainees to other facilities instead of their outright release. This will not resolve the situation and will continue to put those in detention at risk during this deadly pandemic. There needs to be continued pressure on immigration authorities to make sure that all those who are in immigration detention are freed to be with their loved ones.