Internment of undocumented immigrants to begin.

Posted by Duke1676 | Mar 17, 2006 | 32 |

On Tuesday, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced that DHS would be opening detention facilities in the next few weeks to house thousands of Chinese immigrants who have been denied immigration to the United States, yet were refused readmission by the Chinese government. Currently there are an estimated 39,000 undocumented immigrants caught in this diplomatic limbo, but if the more punitive immigration legislation passed in the House back in December, and now being debated in the Senate, was to become law perhaps millions more would join them.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Chertoff said that China last year readmitted 800 people. But that made only a small dent in what he described as a backlog of thousands illegally in the U.S.

“The math is pretty easy — at that rate, we wind up with increasing numbers of migrants who, if we’re going to detain them, we’re going to have to house at enormous expense,” Chertoff said.

He added: “We can’t be in the position any longer where we are paying the burden and bearing the burden for countries that won’t cooperate with us and take their own citizens back.”

The Chinese Embassy in Washington did not immediately return a call for comment.

Currently, 687 Chinese are being held in federal detention facilities, at a daily rate of $95 each, while some 38,000 have been released on bond or under a monitoring program, such as wearing an electronic surveillance bracelet, the Homeland Security Department said later Tuesday.

-snip-

Chertoff also said Homeland Security would open detention facilities in the next few weeks to house entire families of illegal immigrants who hope to bring their children along in order to avoid jail time. “It’ll be humane, but we’re not going to let people get away with this,” he said.

Chertoff’s remarks comes as the Homeland Security Department aims to end its “catch and release” immigration policy by Oct. 1. After that date, all illegal immigrants will be held in U.S. detention centers until they can be returned to their nation of citizenry.

AP

Japanese-American internment camp during WWII

The Department of Homeland Security’s decision to end the “catch and release” immigration policy by Oct.1 comes on the heels of last month’s announcement by the Army Corps of Engineers that a $385 million contract had been awarded to Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg, Root and Brown to build “temporary immigration detention facilities”.

Halliburton Subsidiary Gets Contract to Add Temporary Immigration Detention Centers

New York Times

Feb. 3 – The Army Corps of Engineers has awarded a contract worth up to $385 million for building temporary immigration detention centers to Kellogg Brown & Root, the Halliburton subsidiary…

KBR would build the centers for the Homeland Security Department for an unexpected influx of immigrants, to house people in the event of a natural disaster or for new programs that require additional detention space…

A spokesman for the corps, Clayton Church, said that the centers could be at unused military sites or temporary structures and that each one would hold up to 5,000 people.

“When there’s a large influx of people into the United States, how are we going to feed, house and protect them?” Mr. Church asked. “That’s why these kinds of contracts are there.”

-snip-

In recent months, the Homeland Security Department has promised to increase bed space in its detention centers to hold thousands of illegal immigrants awaiting deportation. In the first quarter of the 2006 fiscal year, nearly 60 percent of the illegal immigrants apprehended from countries other than Mexico were released on their own recognizance.

Domestic security officials have promised to end the releases by increasing the number of detention beds. Last week, domestic security officials announced that they would expand detaining and swiftly deporting illegal immigrants to include those seized near the Canadian border

As the Senate Judiciary Committee takes up immigration reform this week they will be debating provisions that may increase the number of incarcerated undocumented immigrants into the millions. Both the current Senate proposal, “The Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2006”, sponsored by Sen. Arlen Spectrer, and it’s House equivalent, the “Border Protection, Antiterrorism and Illegal Immigration Control Act of 2005″(HR4437) would criminalize almost any immigration infraction and leave the entire undocumented population vulnerable to incarceration. Both bills, in theory, call for the arrest and possible detention of all undocumented immigrants.

Mandatory Detention

Under current law, individuals who arrive without documents, including asylum-seekers, are subject to mandatory detention. Again this applies mainy to those arriving at airports or by sea. 60% of detainees are held in local jails under contract to the federal government, where they are generally not segregated from the criminal population even if they are asylum-seekers and others with no criminal record.

Under this new bill, the mandatory detention policy would be extended to all non-citizens who are detained at any port of entry or anywhere “along” the border for any reason.

“Illegal Presence” and “Aggravated Felonies,”

Section 203 of HR 4437 calls for the creation of a new federal crime of “illegal presence”. As defined in the bill it includes any violation, even technical, of any immigration law or regulation. Even if the immigrant was to fall “out of status” unintentionally, or do to paperwork delays. In essence, the bill makes every immigration violation, however minor, into a federal crime. As drafted, the bill also makes the new crime of “illegal presence” an “aggravated felony” for immigration purposes. This classification would have the further effect of restricting ordinary undocumented immigrants (including those with pending applications) from many forms of administrative or judicial review. Those convicted of an “aggravated felony” would be subject to indefinite detention and/or expedited removal.

Indefinite Detention

Indefinite detention currently applies to non-citizens ordered removed from the United States whose countries refuse to accept them or who have no country because they are stateless. Most often they come from countries without good relations with the United States.

Section 602 of HR 4437 would permit indefinite detention of an increased broad class of non-citizens, including:

those with a contagious disease

any non-citizen convicted of an “aggravated felony,” (see above)

non-citizens whose release would pose foreign policy problems

non-citizens charged even with very minor immigration violations who, based on secret evidence, are deemed a national security risk.

MORE

With the internment of undocumented Chinese immigrants and their families becoming a very real possibility, we need to start to look at the real ramifications of some of this proposed legislation. Homeland Security has already announced its intent to greatly increase the incarceration of undocumented immigrants and Halliburton is ready to supply the facilities to hold them. With HR 4437’s provisions for indefinite detention and the reclassification of even minor offenses as aggravated felonies it is quite possible that all 12 million undocumented immigrants in this country could shortly end up in internment camps no different from the refugee camps we see throughout the rest of the world. We just never thought it could happen here.

cross posted from: Migra Matters

About The Author

Duke1676

32 Comments

Man Eegee on March 17, 2006 at 7:57 pm

time I’ve read through the whole thing, and it still makes me want to go throw up. Thx for your vigilance, Duke, the more eyes that read this, the better informed we will be as a society to fight their fascism.
- Duke1676 on March 17, 2006 at 8:14 pm
  
  You can just call me the “Town Crier”, I go from neighborhood to neighborhood and talk with anyone who’ll listen 🙂 … hopefully others then spead the word
- Arcturus on March 17, 2006 at 9:17 pm
  
  Haitians fleeing killings were routinely held in sub-humane conditions in the 80’s & 90’s — the public noticed briefly & moved on. I don’t know if this adds to the base of knowledge or not (apologies if it’s redundant), but it seems to have greased the skids with one of the most marginalized of immigrants — the Haitian refugees.
  
  The Joseph’s are two teenagers who spent 5 days at sea on a wooden boat; here’s a bit of their story:
  
  Like his younger brother, David is a slight kid—technically an adult—who misses his brother and his mom, and prays a lot. To imagine him as a threat to U.S. national security is comical. But it isn’t David himself who poses the threat, according to the attorney general. It’s his freedom.
  
  In In re D-J-, his 14-page decision in David’s case, Ashcroft wrote that Haitian asylum seekers who enter the country without documents must be locked up. Freeing them would be dangerous, he argued, because that might encourage other Haitians to board U.S.-bound boats, and such immigration “surges” would “injure national security by diverting valuable Coast Guard and DOD resources from [their] counter-terrorism and homeland security responsibilities.” The attorney general also argued that Pakistanis and Palestinians (Somehow indistinguishable to U.S. immigration officials from Haitians?) might take advantage of the route.
  
  Ashcroft’s decision shocked the lawyers who have been working pro bono for six months to free the brothers. “It was unbelievable,” said Candace Jean, who is representing both Josephs. “The attorney general is using terrorism as an excuse to justify a racist immigration policy.”
  
  This, I believe, was in 2002.
  
  Despite the setbacks, separation from each other, and their bewildering position as pawns in the Bush administration’s “war on terrorism,” David and Daniel hold on to the hope that they will not have to wait out the entire legal process in detention.
  
  On March 13 that hope flared when the Board of Immigration Appeals ruled that they could be released on bond. The board rejected the government’s argument that the Josephs should be detained to deter other Haitians from trying to reach the United States. (Amnesty International holds that it is a violation of international law to detain asylum seekers in order to deter others from coming.) “Bond cases before immigration judges are about what the particular alien before the Court has done, and might do. They are not about what other aliens have done or might do,” the board wrote. The Joseph brothers were entitled to freedom since they met two standard criteria, according to the board: They were not dangerous and they were likely to appear for immigration court hearings.
  
  The Josephs are still not free because the Department of Homeland Security—an agency that was only 20 days old at the time—quickly referred their request for bond to Ashcroft. As attorney general he has the power to take and rule on any immigration case.
  
  On April 17, he did so. But his decision, In re D-J-, which literally means “regarding David Joseph,” is not about David. In fact, he is hardly mentioned and never described.
  
  The decision is about preventing Haitians and other refugees from coming to the United States, and it is about the awesome power of the attorney general himself. Ashcroft declared that he is “broadly authorized”—by a U.S. Supreme Court case on the detention of juveniles—to keep non-citizens in detention “based on any reasonable consideration.” And Ashcroft decided that it was reasonable to see Haitians’ freedom as a national security threat.
  
  Ashcroft also rejected the immigration judge’s and board’s contention that each asylum-seeker has a right to an “individualized hearing,” focused on his or her unique circumstances. Instead, Ashcroft declared that undocumented foreigners have no such right. And finally, the attorney general used his decision in David Joseph’s case to declare himself the final authority on all immigration law. His decision, Ashcroft said further, is binding and not subject to appeal. This, despite the fact that Congress assigned immigration law enforcement authority to the new Department of Homeland Security. “[Ashcroft] determines what national security is in this decision. He takes that power unto himself,” said Jeanne Butterfield, executive director of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. Butterfield said she knows of no legal means to challenge the decision.
  
  Long after David Joseph is deported or granted asylum, Ashcroft’s decision in In re D-J- will endure because the attorney general also ordered immigration judges to apply the ruling to the cases of other “similarly situated aliens.” The merits of any individual’s case, then, fall by the wayside once the U.S. government declares a national security interest in incarcerating a particular group of asylum seekers.
  - DuctapeFatwa on March 17, 2006 at 9:26 pm
    
    It was more common in days of yore, today, most nations employ some semblance of law.
    
    It works very well in feudal states.
    - Arcturus on March 17, 2006 at 9:55 pm
      
      that was then . . .
      
      now we’ve got a shiny new anti-septic term:
      
      The Unitary Executive
      - DuctapeFatwa on March 17, 2006 at 10:29 pm
        
        without reading it as “The Urinary Executive”
  - Duke1676 on March 18, 2006 at 12:21 pm
    for two reasons:
    
    As this issue’s been eating up, more and more individual stories have been coming out about just how ineffectual and unfair the current immigration system is. I don’t think people realize that for almost all there is no legal path to immigration.
    Much of the current legislation extends the Ashcroft policy of taking power away from the courts and giving the DHS(now) sole discretion to act as it pleases in many immigration matters. This notion that judicial review can be circumvented is a running theme in all of the restrictive immigration legislation like HR4437, Specter’s and Cornyn. According to this legislation immigrants can be detained indefinitely on the sole pronouncement of DHS for any number of reasons.
    - Duke1676 on March 18, 2006 at 12:23 pm
      
      “this issue’s been Heating up” not eating up
    - Arcturus on March 18, 2006 at 5:33 pm
      
      The legal path to immigration lies through Cuba, doesn’t it?
      
      “This notion that judicial review can be circumvented is a running theme” through just about anything they choose to do . . .
      
      There’s a pic on the aclu page I linked to, from 1996, of a refugee in orange jumpsuit, surrounded by barbed wire, being searched as he re-enters the facility. Without the caption, I would have assumed it was from Gitmo.
      
      Thanks for the series.
- maryb2004 on March 18, 2006 at 10:13 am
  
  This is the third time I’ve read it (not counting the three times I read it on Manny’s blog because I couldn’t believe what I was reading). Thanks Duke. Yes, even though I too want to throw up, I’m glad someone is writing about it.
DuctapeFatwa on March 17, 2006 at 8:03 pm

it here, and everywhere else you’ve posted it.

All who read it lose the option, now and forever, of saying “We didn’t know.”

It is probably better if I shut up now.
- brokenkeyboard on March 18, 2006 at 12:58 pm
  
  what CAN we do about this?
  
  a rally of 300,000 in chicago is a huge sign of hope, but its not going to end this by itself.
  
  We need to get fucking organized and fight this, while we still can.
  - Duke1676 on March 18, 2006 at 2:25 pm
    
    from going any further and putting millions more in jeapardy. That’s the first step….. after that … make America aware of what is already going on…LTE, Blog, tell a friend, family member, neighbor…call into radio stations, whatever you can do..
    
    AILA
    
    Justice for Immigrants
    
    NIF
    
    ACLU
Street Kid on March 17, 2006 at 8:07 pm

Knew before I read it that Haliburton/KBR got the contract. Pathetic.
americanforliberty on March 17, 2006 at 8:54 pm

I think Haliburton should change its name to Satan Inc. because they seem to profit off human misery and misfortune.
- rumi on March 18, 2006 at 3:00 pm
  
  The irony is found in other sources that tell how FEMAco is allowed to used faith based funding and utilize free labor from the detainees.
  
  I can post links if the links aren’t here already and anyone is interested.
  - sbj on March 18, 2006 at 7:25 pm
    
    Yes! I remember reading something about that; using detainees as prison labor, administered by the military through various govt. agencies. I had no idea this whole ugly idea was actually advanced as faras it is.
    
    There is one sure thing that heppens to those who become corrupted by power, whether it be an individual, a society or a nation. They lose their capacity to feel shame in direct proportion to the rise in tolerance they have for theirown atrocities.
    
    Nowhere on the planet is this sharp acceleration in the decline of basic humanity more in evidence than it is in this US government and it’s supporters.
    - rumi on March 19, 2006 at 9:51 am
      
      The faith based funding for FEMA was reinforced recently when GWB issued another proclamation.
      
      from AlterNet
      The question of faith-based aid
      
      By presidential fiat (now known, euphemistically as an “executive order”), Bush “ordered the Department of Homeland Security yesterday to create a center for faith-based and community initiatives within 45 days to eliminate regulatory, contracting and programmatic barriers to providing federal funds to religious groups to deliver social services,” according to the Washington Post.
      
      ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
      Bush’s Mysterious ‘New Programs’
      
      Not that George W. Bush needs much encouragement, but Sen. Lindsey Graham suggested to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales a new target for the administration’s domestic operations – Fifth Columnists, supposedly disloyal Americans who sympathize and collaborate with the enemy.
      ———
      “I stand by this President’s ability, inherent to being Commander in Chief, to find out about Fifth Column movements, and I don’t think you need a warrant to do that,” Graham added, volunteering to work with the administration to draft guidelines for how best to neutralize this alleged threat.
      
      “Senator,” a smiling Gonzales responded, “the President already said we’d be happy to listen to your ideas.”
      ————
      On its face, the Army’s labor program refers to inmates housed in federal, state and local jails. The Army also cites various federal laws that govern the use of civilian labor and provide for the establishment of prison camps in the United States, including a federal statute that authorizes the Attorney General to “establish, equip, and maintain camps upon sites selected by him” and “make available … the services of United States prisoners” to various government departments, including the Department of Defense.
      ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
      I just got back from a FEMA Detainment Camp
      ———–
      
      Some of these might be duplicates of ones already posted but they’re good ones.
      
      There is one sure thing that heppens to those who become corrupted by power, whether it be an individual, a society or a nation. They lose their capacity to feel shame in direct proportion to the rise in tolerance they have for theirown atrocities.
      
      This is a deadly accurate insight.
      - sbj on March 19, 2006 at 12:58 pm
        
        I remember reading that article about the Fema detainment camp several months ago and being chilled by it.
        
        This link here is to the Army’s Civilian Inmate Labor Program document.
Kidspeak on March 17, 2006 at 9:37 pm

This is what I expected, also, when I heard of the contract. So we will be putting people – including entire families with children – into prison camps.

I am sick, utterly.

“““““`

At a minimum, if I could draw well enough, I’d put here a graphic of the Statue of Liberty HERE, weeping.
dove on March 17, 2006 at 9:57 pm

So.

How long do you reckon until those unfortunate enough to be imprisoned in these camps are required to start ‘providing labour to ‘subsidise’ the cost of their ‘protection,’ ‘housing’ and food’?

Six months? As long as a year do you think?

Because among other things, this looks to me like a way of getting a captive labour force — or rather, expanding dramatically the captive labour force that already exists in the U.S. through the prison system.
- DuctapeFatwa on March 17, 2006 at 10:49 pm
  
  in public internet forums.
  
  Thank you.
- high5 on March 18, 2006 at 2:29 am
  
  Then there will be the US version of “Arbeit Mach Frei”.
  Oh wait, there already is one version of that in the US: “Soldiering for us to make a green card.”
Man Eegee on March 17, 2006 at 10:02 pm

Farmers are starting to organize and lobby their Senators to re-think any opposition to a guest-worker program. Here’s two articles, one from California, the other from Alabama. Just some food for thought (pun intended)
alohaleezy on March 17, 2006 at 11:42 pm

I am so sick to my stomach after reading this. What the hell have they done to our country? Land of the free, home of the brave. WIll these poor people become our workforce? Or should I say Halliburton’s cheap labor work force? I am so ashamed of this country. We must do something to stop the madness. So much for give me your tired, your poor. Isn’t there any ONE representative that will stand next to Feingold and Conyers and be outraged this is happening?
- DuctapeFatwa on March 18, 2006 at 12:14 am
  
  I have not been able to find where any politician has said anything about the concentration camps.
  
  To be fair, it is not really up to them, this seems to be a decision that was made by Chertoff and KBR.
roseeriter on March 18, 2006 at 3:48 am

1-5. Civilian inmate labor programs
a. Civilian inmate labor programs benefit both the Army and corrections systems by–
(1) Providing a source of labor at no direct labor cost to Army installations to accomplish tasks that would not be
possible otherwise due to the manning and funding constraints under which the Army operates.
(2) Providing meaningful work for inmates and, in some cases, additional space to alleviate overcrowding in nearby
corrections facilities.
(3) Making cost-effective use of buildings and land not otherwise being used.
b. Except for the 3 exceptions listed in paragraph 2-1d below, installation civilian inmate labor programs may use
civilian inmate labor only from Federal corrections facilities located either off or on the installation.
c. Keys to operating an effective civilian inmate labor program on Army installations include–
(1) Establishing a comprehensive lease agreement, interservice, interagency, and/or interdepartmental support agreement
(ISA), and/or memoranda of agreement with the corrections facility.
(2) Developing a cooperative working relationship between installation personnel and corrections facility personnel.
(3) Working closely with installation government employee labor unions to ensure union leaders understand the
program and have current information on program status.
(4) Training all installation personnel involved in the operation or administration of the program frequently.
(5) Developing a public affairs plan informing the installation and the surrounding local community of the program
and work projects assigned to civilian inmate labor.

And the civilian inmates will be us because NO real criminal will be allowed.

(2) Under no circumstances will the following types of inmates be permitted in the Civilian Inmate Labor Program:
(a) A person in whom there is a significant public interest as determined by the corrections facility superintendent in
coordination with the installation commander.
(b) A person who has been a significant management problem in their current corrections facility or in another
facility.
(c) A principal organized crime figure.
(d) An inmate convicted of a sex offense or whose criminal history includes such conduct.
(e) An inmate convicted of a violent crime or whose criminal history includes such conduct.
(f) An inmate convicted of the sale or intent to distribute illegal drugs who held a leadership position in any drug
conspiracy, or has been involved with drugs within the last 3 years while in prison.
(g) An escape risk.
(h) An inmate who poses a threat to the general public as determined by the corrections facility superintendent in coordination with the installation commander.
(i) An inmate declared or found insane or mentally incompetent by a court, administrative proceeding, or physician, or under treatment for a mental disease or disorder.
(j) An inmate convicted of arson.
(k) A Federal inmate convicted while on active duty, presently serving a sentence for that conviction.
f. Army personnel. Department of the Army personnel will not be involved with custodial aspects of inmate labor details.

LINK
- BrendaStewart on March 18, 2006 at 12:39 pm
  
  Then to whom are they gonna assign to guard the inmate..It is sheer madnessssssssssss! They have all lost their everlovin minds! They need to go back to the drawing board. They are getting more rediculious than ever. We need to stop them from all this madness.
- Militarytracy on March 18, 2006 at 1:32 pm
  
  immediately upon reading this……soon I suppose these folks in “limbo” will begin to crank out goods for the economy. It will be a simple task to add buttheads like me who mouth off but aren’t criminal, it isn’t as if I’m jail – I’ll just be deterred from creating uprising and chaos like these unspoken for people. It smells like Hitler all over again.
boran2 on March 18, 2006 at 10:05 am

Ugh. Every day the policies of this government read more and more like a science fiction novel. Why can’t these xenophobic idiots see that the great waves of immigration in the late 19th and early 20th centuries greatly benefitted this country?!!
- stormkite on March 18, 2006 at 1:40 pm
  
  And why don’t you see that the people making these decisions don’t give a rat’s ASS about benefitting this country?
  
  This is taking the “deport to the border” one step further.. now, if you piss off your boss (by, say, asking to actually be PAID as you agreed) you won’t be sent home, you’ll be locked up, along with your family, for the rest of your lives — and you’ll ALL have to work anyway, so it’s not like you gained anything at all.
  
  It’s not JUST to create slave labor camps; done right (and it will be done right) it’ll keep all the OTHER slaves in line… and most of the brown citizens as well, because you can also bet Cheney’s Halliburton stock that DHS and ICE won’t be looking at passports or green cards or voter registrations before they slam the big steel door on people.
  
  Just think of the money saved on transportation costs and such when corporations no longer have to outsource to get slave labor rates.
BrendaStewart on March 18, 2006 at 12:45 pm

The inmates are left to run the house of bedlam! They are absolutely nonthinking ppl and we have them in our government, running it. Geez Louise. Call it Animal house if you will. Yelling and scraming to the top of my voice. Someone please stop this before we all end up like the illegal immigrants….which I think we already have.

Internment of undocumented immigrants to begin.

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