On August 6, 2009 the Obama administration announced that the immigration detention system needed to be reformed and that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) would move away from the penal system that had been created and towards a more civil detention system, appropriate for holding immigrants who are held under an administrative rather than criminal authority. The announcement was followed on October 6th, 2009, with the release of a report assessing the immigration detention system and recommending specific reforms.

One year later, the National Immigration Justice Center (NIJC) and Detention Watch Network (DWN) released a report titled, Year One Report Card: Human Rights and the Obama Administration’s Immigration Detention Reforms, which discussed what detention reforms had been made by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and what major improvements were still needed. The report flagged major issues in the areas of mistreatment of detainees by guards, limited access to counsel, and inadequate medical care at detention facilities. It also discussed ICE’s continued over-reliance on the penal system and an “anti-reform” culture at ICE field offices. On a positive note, the report found that ICE has a strong commitment to reform, had been engaging NGOs, and a civil detention system was being designed and developed.

It is now two years later, and it is important to take note of where we are today.

This week, Human Rights First  released a new report titled Jails and Jumpsuits: Transforming the U.S. Immigration Detention System a Two Year Review, which discusses the progress made towards immigration detention reform over the last two years as well as the continued challenges that ICE has yet to address. The report specifically mentions that the overwhelming majority of detainees are still held in jails or jail-like facilities and that since the reforms were announced, ICE has added over 2,700 detention beds instead of reducing the number. The report also mentions that while some movement has occurred towards a less penal system, it will only affect 14% of ICE’s current detention system. It notes that many detained immigrants still do not have adequate access to counsel. Lastly, this report gives ICE detailed recommendations as to how it can fix many of the issues that still exist.

There have been numerous other reports released over the past couple years that have assessed immigration detention and recommended numerous reforms. A digest of these reports has been compiled by the National Immigration Forum in Summaries of Recent Reports on Immigration Detention, where there are brief summaries of each report and a link to the entire report. The National Immigration Forum has also released its own report titled The Math of Immigration Detention, highlighting just how much it costs the federal government each year to hold individuals in its 33,400 detention beds at over 250 facilities, with ICE currently spending over $5.5 million per day and over $2 billion in fiscal year 2012.

All these reports underscore the fact that while some progress has been made over the last two years, ICE still has a long way to go to implement much needed reforms to its detention system. There are still a great number of open complaints about the current detention system including abuses by guards, conditions of facilities, length of detention time, and issues with lack of counsel. For ICE to meet its own goal of moving away from a penal system of detention to a civil system, these issues need to be addressed.

This post was written by Forum Policy Fellow Josh Breisblatt and originally posted on Immigration Impact.

At a time when we should be looking for ways to curb costs, some in Congress are actually attempting to spend more by expanding immigration enforcement programs. In May, Chairman of the Judiciary Committee Lamar Smith (R-TX) introduced H.R. 1932 titled, “Keep Our Communities Safe Act of 2011,” an act which would allow the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to keep individuals in detention without a bond hearing before an immigration judge while they wait for a final resolution of their case. It would also authorize indefinite detention of those who have been ordered removed but cannot be deported. Aside from being bad immigration policy, Smith’s legislation would also increase an already bloated immigration detention budget.  A new paper recently released by the National Immigration Forum examines just how much our immigration detention system currently costs taxpayers. The findings should raise some eyebrows.

The immigration detention system, operated by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), will cost more than $2 billion in Fiscal Year 2012 at the level the Administration requested. This amount provides ICE with funding to maintain its current detention capacity of 33,400 people in more than 250 facilities on any given night at an average cost of $5.5 million per day.

Incredibly, some in Congress think spending nearly $4,000 a minute to jail immigrants (most of whom have not committed any crimes) is not enough. If the current DHS appropriations bill (passed by the House for FY 2012) becomes law, the government’s budget for immigration detention and deportations will be $184 million more next year than it is this year—enough to jail 34,000 immigrants at any one time.  This would continue a trend in which the number of detention beds has nearly doubled over the past seven years, from 18,000 in 2004 to the current capacity of 33,400.

The enormous cost of immigration detention might be justified if DHS was deporting more dangerous criminals, but this is not the case.  Despite claims that ICE policy prioritizes the apprehension and detention of individuals convicted of serious criminal offenses, more than half of all immigrant detainees in 2009 and 2010 had no criminal records. Of those with any criminal history, nearly 20% were for minor traffic offenses.

There are, however, alternatives that could easily bring down the cost of detention—alternatives ranging in cost from as low as 30 cents up to 14 dollars a day per individual.  For example, only 11% of detainees having committed what ICE considers violent crimes. If ICE detained only violent criminals, they could save more than $4.4 million dollars per night even using the most expensive alternative programs. This would result in an annual savings of over $1.6 billion—an 80% reduction in costs.

During a time of increased attention on fiscal accountability by the Federal Government, the amount we spend on immigration detention should be subjected to careful scrutiny. At the very least, ICE must reexamine and modify its current procedures, including reducing its overreliance on detention and maximizing its alternatives programs to take advantage of cost savings.  Until it does, the numbers behind the current immigration detention system simply do not add up to sensible policy.

Immage by Flidkr user Common Language Project.

Last month, the National Immigration Forum was invited by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to participate in a new advisory committee created in response to growing criticism and concern about the so-called “Secure Communities” program.  The committee is tasked with advising Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Director John Morton on “ways to improve Secure Communities.”  Specifically, the committee is asked to deliver recommendations regarding the treatment of individuals identified through Secure Communities as a result of being charged with minor traffic offenses.

The Forum has been a vocal and vehement critic of the Secure Communities program since its inception.  DHS launched the program clumsily and hastily without thinking through the consequences.  We are deeply troubled by the Secure Communities program for a number of reasons.  The program lacks accountability in how it is being operated and in terms of the consequences for misuse of the program.  Despite the program’s stated goals and seductive-sounding name, it unfairly ensnares immigrants who are not threats to public safety and forces them into the bog of our broken immigration system.  It also erodes the trust that communities place in their local law enforcement agencies and disrupts community policing efforts, making our communities less safe.  Scant safeguards for civil rights and weak oversight have created the potential for unlawful detentions under the auspices of immigration “holds” or detainers, abuse and profiling.   

Elected leaders across the country agree. In Massachusetts and New York, Governors Deval Patrick and Andrew Cuomo decided that their states would no longer participate in the program. Governor Pat Quinn from Illinois terminated his state’s participation in the program shortly before the Illinois House of Representatives passed legislation sharply critical of the Secure Communities program.  In addition, several municipalities and counties voted to opt out, only to be told later by DHS that they didn’t have a choice in the matter.   

Despite concern and confusion about how the Secure Communities program is operating, turmoil in a growing number states and localities, and resistance from law enforcement, DHS had announced the program will be national in scope by 2013. Fortunately, after months of missteps, DHS has made some effort to address problems with Secure Communities. That’s where the advisory committee comes in.  

While we have repeatedly criticized the Secure Communities program, we welcome the opportunity to discuss and inform the Department on problems in this deeply flawed program whose design and implementation are cause for deep concern. It is crucial that the advisory committee consider and address the program’s myriad failures beyond the question of responding to individuals who are ensnared by Secure Communities due to low level offenses or infractions.  We are not interested in surface “fixes” that leave structural flaws intact.  We are also wary of continuing to send broken enforcement programs for repairs while those programs continue to operate.  We’ve been down this unpleasant and unproductive road with the widely panned 287(g) program. 

The Forum believes that the Secure Communities program must be halted until several key issues are addressed. DHS must meaningfully address the erosion of public trust in law enforcement created by Secure Communities.  Immigrants as well as U.S. citizens are much more hesitant to contact the police either for protection or to report a crime when doing so may put them or their family at risk of immigration consequences.  Secure Communities has led to the initiation of deportation proceedings for numerous victims of crime, particularly of domestic violence, who have called for police protection.  ICE must ensure that victims or witnesses who seek police protection do not find themselves the target of deportation as a result.   

Because Secure Communities lacks the internal safeguards to prevent profiling, DHS must address bias and discriminatory policy practices that are feeding people into the program.  ICE operates its Secure Communities program at the point of arrest, rather than after a conviction, meaning that individuals arrested on fabricated or pretextual arrests are nonetheless swept into the immigration enforcement machinery.  Anecdotes about racial profiling in active Secure Communities jurisdictions, combined with high numbers of arrests for minor traffic offenses, present a real concern that Secure Communities is serving as a conduit for discriminatory arrests.  ICE must acknowledge and eliminate the incentive created by Secure Communities for police to arrest individuals for the inappropriate purpose of checking their immigration status.  Further, ICE must monitor for, and deliver consequences to, jurisdictions that misuse Secure Communities.  

Meanwhile, the rapid and widespread expansion of the Secure Communities program into local law enforcement jurisdictions has caused pervasive confusion and misunderstanding as to the roles and responsibilities of local, state, and federal agents.

DHS should amend the rules so that states and localities, and not the federal government, can decide if Secure Communities is appropriate for them.  The Federal Government can’t have it both ways.  They can’t tell states that only federal officials are responsible for immigration matters on the one hand, and then try to make federal immigration agents out of state and local law enforcement on the other.  

As a participant on the advisory committee, the Forum will urge resolution of our concerns.  And in terms of process, a final point, we strongly believe it is imperative that the advisory committee hears from the public- including immigrant communities, domestic violence advocates, and local leaders- who are being impacted by Secure Communities now and who may feel its impact in the future.   

Yet, there are plenty of Americans (and Americans-in-waiting) who, sometimes at great personal risk, will stand up to defend the rights of immigrants regardless of their own status and regardless of the personal consequences.  On June 18 at the Netroots Nation conference in Minneapolis, Minnesota, just over two dozen of these individuals were recognized for their “extraordinary acts of courage on behalf of immigrants and refugees” in the first “Freedom from Fear” awards.

Many of the awardees are DREAM Act activists, like the long-distance hiking quartet of Gaby Pacheco, Felipe Matos, Juan Rodriguez, and Carlos Roa.  These undocumented DREAM activist students set out from Miami, Florida, on January 1, 2010, on what they called the Trail of DREAMS, a 1,500-mile hike to Washington, DC.  Along the way, they had an opportunity to share their stories with thousands of people, but did so risking arrest and deportation daily.  They made it to Washington, and served as an inspiration for immigration advocates here who fought to push the DREAM Act through a lame duck Congress just before Christmas.

Undocumented worker Osefel Andrade of Anaheim, California, stood up for his rights and those of his coworkers when he filed a lawsuit against his employer, alleging the employer paid substandard wages, harassed workers perceived to be undocumented, and discriminated against Latino workers.  Mr. Andrade was arrested by immigration authorities after filing the lawsuit, and since has continued to fight for the rights of his co-workers while fighting his own deportation.  The case is an example of how unscrupulous employers use the threat of deportation to exploit their undocumented workers.

Retired minister Gene Lefebvre and nurse Sarah Roberts, of Tucson, Arizona, braved the unforgiving climate and geography of the Arizona desert, and the charged atmosphere of Arizona politics, as co-founders of the organization “No More Deaths.”   The organization relies on hundreds of volunteers who walk desert trails near the border with food, water, and medical supplies in an effort to prevent the deaths of migrants crossing the desert into the U.S.

When Antonella Packard of Saratoga Springs, Utah, spoke out in support of a DREAM Act activist who was sent to jail by the office of Senator Orrin Hatch, she was purged from the Utah Republican Hispanic Assembly.  That didn’t stop her from speaking out in support of immigrants who she felt were being deprived of their rights.  Her advocacy on behalf of immigrants has made her unpopular with conservative Republicans in her state, where she is now Northwest Director of Somos Repubicans, a Republican Latino outreach group.

The case of Maria Bolanos, of Hyattsville, Maryland, illustrates what’s wrong with Secure Communities, a program operated by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).  Ms. Bolanos made a call to the police after an argument with her partner that turned violent.  Instead of protection, Ms. Bolanos was brought to the police station for fingerprinting.  Through the Secure Communities program, her fingerprints were shared with ICE, and she was found to be in the country illegally.  Despite the fact that she faces deportation, she has spoken out against Secure Communities, and has raised awareness about how the program can lead to less secure communities, when police and federal immigration enforcement agents share information.

These are just a few of the remarkable individuals who were recipients of the Freedom from Fear awards.  You can read more about the awardees and the Freedom from Fear Awards in this press release from the Public Interest Projects.

The heat surrounding the current debate on immigration makes it difficult, and maybe downright dangerous, for the ordinary person who sees the injustices created by our broken immigration system and our Congress’ unwillingness to consider solutions.

Yet, there are plenty of Americans (and Americans-in-waiting) who, sometimes at great personal risk, will stand up to defend the rights of immigrants regardless of their own status and regardless of the personal consequences.  On June 18 at the Netroots Nation conference in Minneapolis, Minnesota, just over two dozen of these individuals were recognized for their “extraordinary acts of courage on behalf of immigrants and refugees” in the first “Freedom from Fear” awards.

Many of the awardees are DREAM Act activists, like the long-distance hiking quartet of Gaby Pacheco, Felipe Matos, Juan Rodriguez, and Carlos Roa.  These undocumented DREAM activist students set out from Miami, Florida, on January 1, 2010, on what they called the Trail of DREAMS, a 1,500-mile hike to Washington, DC.  Along the way, they had an opportunity to share their stories with thousands of people, but did so risking arrest and deportation daily.  They made it to Washington, and served as an inspiration for immigration advocates here who fought to push the DREAM Act through a lame duck Congress just before Christmas.

Undocumented worker Osefel Andrade of Anaheim, California, stood up for his rights and those of his coworkers when he filed a lawsuit against his employer, alleging the employer paid substandard wages, harassed workers perceived to be undocumented, and discriminated against Latino workers.  Mr. Andrade was arrested by immigration authorities after filing the lawsuit, and since has continued to fight for the rights of his co-workers while fighting his own deportation.  The case is an example of how unscrupulous employers use the threat of deportation to exploit their undocumented workers.

Retired minister Gene Lefebvre and nurse Sarah Roberts, of Tucson, Arizona, braved the unforgiving climate and geography of the Arizona desert, and the charged atmosphere of Arizona politics, as co-founders of the organization “No More Deaths.”   The organization relies on hundreds of volunteers who walk desert trails near the border with food, water, and medical supplies in an effort to prevent the deaths of migrants crossing the desert into the U.S.

When Antonella Packard of Saratoga Springs, Utah, spoke out in support of a DREAM Act activist who was sent to jail by the office of Senator Orrin Hatch, she was purged from the Utah Republican Hispanic Assembly.  That didn’t stop her from speaking out in support of immigrants who she felt were being deprived of their rights.  Her advocacy on behalf of immigrants has made her unpopular with conservative Republicans in her state, where she is now Northwest Director of Somos Repubicans, a Republican Latino outreach group.

The case of Maria Bolanos, of Hyattsville, Maryland, illustrates what’s wrong with Secure Communities, a program operated by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).  Ms. Bolanos made a call to the police after an argument with her partner that turned violent.  Instead of protection, Ms. Bolanos was brought to the police station for fingerprinting.  Through the Secure Communities program, her fingerprints were shared with ICE, and she was found to be in the country illegally.  Despite the fact that she faces deportation, she has spoken out against Secure Communities, and has raised awareness about how the program can lead to less secure communities, when police and federal immigration enforcement agents share information.

These are just a few of the remarkable individuals who were recipients of the Freedom from Fear awards.  You can read more about the awardees and the Freedom from Fear Awards in this press release from the Public Interest Projects.