Private Prisons Running ICE Detention Centers The Rights of the Detained- A Side-by-Side Look
Kansas Reentry Resources
A Look at Lobbying
In This Issue A Look at Private Prisons October 2020 Letter from the Executive Director
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Word of the Month
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Kansas Resources
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Who’s Running Immigration Detention Centers
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You Scratch My Back, I’ll Scratch Yours
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The Rights of the Detained- A Side-by-Side Look
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Letter from the Executive Director Last month, we hit the tip of the iceberg as we began to discuss the prison industrial complex. As we learned some things, we had more questions. If you think of prison as a business, you have to look at how those types of companies can expand. That’s why this issue is about immigration housing. Immigration is a complicated issue, so we wanted to focus on how companies that profit from incarceration make more money as they incarcerate immigration detainees. Although only a small percentage of U.S. facilities are run by private corporations, nearly half of immigration detention centers are run by the two largest private prison companies in America. We also address the complicated question of how the rights of the undocumented differ from the rights of inmates, and the impact that it has on how detainees are treated. Additionally, you can’t discuss big corporations and politics without talking about lobbying. We have also included an article on the money private prison companies spend to influence politicians. We hope you enjoy this issue. Stay safe, Porche Proffit
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Masthead and Contributors Editor-in-Chief, Porche Proffit Editor, Ericka Foster
Contributors Contributing Editor, Lakia Goodman Writer, Maggie Allen Writer, Natalie Rodriguez-Steen Nutrition and dietician, Isabella Dos Santos Cover Photo: pixabay.com/photos/fence-freedom-prison-hands-fingers-2163951/ Positive Transitioning Inc. is a non–profit organization that provides information and resources for individuals reentering the community after incarceration. In addition to this magazine, Positive Transitioning Inc. offers a 24-hour Resource/Listening Line that services all 50 states. The Resource/Listening line is staffed by life coaches, and provides individuals with the immediate support and resources they may be needed during reentry. Positive Transitioning Inc. also provides individuals life coaches that will assist them in every step of the reentry process: housing, education, employment, vocational training, obtaining government benefits, veteran assistance, medical management, sponsorship, financial stability, family reintegration, and legal assisting. Currently Positive Transitioning Inc. is entirely web–based as we are hoping that this makes it easily accessible for anyone to access from anywhere.
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Word of the Month pol¡i¡tics the activities associated with the governance of a country or other area, especially the debate or conflict among individuals or parties having or hoping to achieve power. In our age there is no such thing as 'keeping out of politics.' All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred and schizophrenia. ~George Orwell
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Kansas Resources Oxford House Kansas Re-Entry Program www.oxfordhousekansas.org/reentry.html With locations around the state of Kansas, Oxford House provides individuals coming from jails, prisons, and other institutions an opportunity to live in a safe, alcohol and drug-free environment, so that they may re-establish their lives. Mirror, Inc. mirrorinc.org/who-we-are/ As part of its reentry program, Mirror, Inc. offers art therapy, employment classes, moral reconation therapy, home confinement, healthy eating, financial literacy, and tenant’s rights. Seeds of Hope seedsofhopejailministry.org/ Seeds of Hope is a re-entry program that offers support for individuals struggling to get back on track and is built around moral reconation therapy. With programs like Second Chance Reentry Initiative Mentoring Program (SCRIMP), Seeds of Hope offers resources to help individuals released from incarceration rebuild their lives. Mental Health America of the Heartland mhah.org/heartland-housing/ Mental Health America of the Heartland is dedicated to promoting the mental health of the community, and improving the quality of life of persons with mental illness, through advocacy, education, and support. One of their programs, KanDo Apartments in Kansas City, KS is a HUD owned and subsidized program for lowincome individuals with a mental health diagnosis.
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National Resources American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) aclu.org/issues/prisoners-rights Prisoners’ rights to read, write, speak, practice their religion, and communicate with the outside world are often curtailed far beyond what is necessary for institutional security. Not only are these activities central to the ability of prisoners to retain their humanity, but they also contribute to the flow of information between prisons and the outside world and thus provide a vital form of oversight of these closed institutions. CareerOneStop careeronestop.org/Site/american-job-center.aspx Located across the country, American Job Centers can help you look for work and offer job search workshops, free computer access, and more. National Alliance on Mental Illness nami.org/ The purpose of NAMI Alabama is to provide support, education, and advocacy for persons with mental illnesses, their families, and others whose lives are affected mental health disorders. National HIRE Network hirenetwork.org The goal of the National H.I.R.E. Network is to increase the number and quality of job opportunities available to people with criminal records by changing public policies, employment practices and public opinion. National Reentry Resource Center (NRRC) nrrc.csgjusticecenter.org Funded and administered by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA), the National Reentry Resource Center (NRRC) is the nation’s primary source of information and guidance in reentry. U.S. Veterans Administration va.gov/ABOUT_VA/index.asp Most veterans who are in jail or prison will eventually reenter the community. VA’s HCRV program is designed to promote success and prevent homelessness among Veterans returning home after incarceration. COVID-19 FAQs for the Public Housing, Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) (including the Project-based Voucher Program (PBV)) and Native American Programs hud.gov/sites/dfiles/PIH/documents/COVID19_FAQ_PIH_Final.pdf This is a FAQ that lists resources for individuals in public housing.
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Who’s Running Immigration Detention Centers By Maggie Allen
According to federal government data from as recently as April 2019, Texas (14,481), Louisiana (4,415), Arizona (4,405), California (4,353), and Georgia (3,719), are the top five states with the largest number of people in U.S. immigration detention per day. Over 70 percent of them are held in privately-run immigrant prisons. The use of private prisons to detain immigrants is not new, but the business has boomed since President Trump took office. At least 24 immigration detention centers and more than 17,000 beds were added in the past three years to the sprawling detention system run by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Immigrant prisons and jails have been shown to hold people for longer periods under the Trump administration than under the Obama administration. In FY 2017, the average length of stay at any one immigrant prison or jail was 34 days, compared to 22 days in FY 2016 and 21 days in FY 2015. Some people were released the same day they were detained, indicating that ICE did not need to obtain court approval to deport them. Overall, $3 billion a year is spent housing a record high of roughly 50,000 people, the majority of whom have no criminal record. According to ICE’s FY 2018 budget, on average it costs $133.99 a day to maintain one adult detention bed. Immigration groups have pegged the number closer to $200 a day, and the cost to maintain a bed for mothers and children to stay together in a family residential center costs around $319 a day, according to the Department of Homeland Security. ICE itself claims that the average bed rate for juvenile-specific facilities (children separated from parents) is $139.40 per day. It is worth noting, however, that the U.S. Government Accountability Office looked into ICE’s budget requests and found that its methodology was inaccurate and frequently unreliable.
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A USA Today investigation revealed conditions and treatment; “more than 400 allegations of sexual assault or abuse, inadequate medical care, regular hunger strikes, frequent use of solitary confinement, more than 800 instances of physical force against detainees, nearly 20,000 grievances filed by detainees and at least 29 fatalities, including seven suicides� since January 2017. For this investigation, network reporters interviewed 35 current or former detainees; reviewed hundreds of documents from lawsuits, financial records and government contracts; and toured seven ICE facilities from across multiple states. They found that private prison companies have established close ties with officials from the very top of the federal government all the way down to the local level. They also tend to curry favor with sheriffs and city officials who can frequently serve as middlemen to secure big-money ICE contracts. While there are many private companies vying to contract with ICE, five players have risen to the top, operating the facilities and donating large sums to predominantly Republican candidates, who will in turn push legislation to benefit them. These companies are GEO Group, LaSalle Corrections, Immigration Centers of America (ICA), Management & Training Corp (MTC), and CoreCivic. MTC, founded by Robert L. Marquardt, has been around for 39 years. CoreCivic and GEO Group, run by Damon Hininger and George Zoley respectively, have been operating for 35 years. In 2013, both companies converted most of their holdings into real estate investment trusts, allowing them to pay income taxes only on the business not covered by the trust. The rest of the taxes are paid by shareholders. Now, GEO Group and CoreCivic combined hold well over half the total number of ICE detainees, and their revenues reached $3.5 billion in 2015. Both are certainly giants in the industry, but GEO Group receives more taxpayer funding for immigration detention than any other ICE contractor ($184 million in FY17). It is also diversifying more than its competitors, seeking international contracts for prisons in Australia, South Africa and the United Kingdom, and buying smaller
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companies with contracts in psychiatric care, civil immigration detention, and electronic ankle monitoring for low-level offenders. Despite their considerable size and strength as individual entities, the five companies are perfectly willing to join forces to protect their interests. In October of 2019, CoreCivic, the GEO Group and MTC formed an advocacy group called the Day 1 Alliance. Its national spokeswoman is Alexandra Wilkes, who worked for America Rising and a PAC with the same name that backed Republican candidates in part by digging up damaging information on their Democratic opponents. Prior to this, all five companies’ lobbying efforts during the Obama administration peaked at $2.75 million in 2016, according to federal disclosure reports and data from the Center for Responsive Politics. GEO Group in particular donated a fair amount to the Trump campaign, both directly to his inaugural committee and to a Trump-aligned super PAC, and even began shifting corporate events to Trumpowned businesses. Their stock prices quickly rose upon his election. Learn more about lobbying in our lobbying article. It has been paramount to the rise of private, for-profit prisons in the United States. Costs to actually house and care for the detainees are routinely slashed, but more and more money is put towards keeping public opinion of immigrants low and disinterest in their fates high. In the face of harsh crackdowns and inhumane treatment, children torn from their parents and held in “tent cities” and cages, adults given sub-par medical attention in emergencies, we the American public cannot and should not claim ignorance or nonchalance anymore. For the sake of our fellow humans, regardless of their origins, we need to hold these companies accountable by following their news, policies, and public political actions like we’re listening for our lottery numbers. Most of all, we need to understand the gravity of our continued disinterest; the danger of empathy only extending to the edge of our own personal circles.
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You Scratch My Back, I’ll Scratch Yours By Ericka Foster A U.S. congressperson is required to know everything about everything – economics, the environment, the community, and more. They will depend on their staff for some information, but there are also people floating around the capitol building ready and willing to give them a crash course on why they should adopt a cause. Those people are called lobbyists. It sounds harmless enough, doesn’t it? What are lobbyists? Lobbying means trying to influence a public official on an issue. If you wanted to stop by the office of your local official to explain why your neighborhood needs its street lights replaced, that meets the description of lobbying. However, states have varying definitions of lobbying, based on if and how much money changes hands. When a large corporation pays a law firm millions of dollars to wine and dine local lawmakers, that’s called lobbying too. A cynic might say that the corporation is going to get better results. And…most of us would agree. According to 2019 second quarter reports, one of the nation’s largest private prison companies, GEO Group, paid a lobbying firm $120,000 to lobby for “publicprivate partnerships in correctional services.” – in three months. Money talks Lobbying isn’t just about making a stop by a congressman’s office or even taking them out to dinner. Millions of dollars flow through political action committees (PACs). A PAC is an organization with a tax designation specifically created to donate to a candidate or cause. PACs can be corporate, center around a professional group, or designated to an issue. There are quite a few laws designed to regulate PACs and there are multiple categories: super PACs and hybrid PACs to name a few. Additionally, a company’s can also make political contributions to politicians. I’m not talking about a $20 payroll deduction. According to Center for Responsive Politics, GEO Group individuals made nearly $900,000 contributions in 2020.
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GEO Group and CoreCivic combined hold well over half the total number of ICE detainees, and their revenues reached $3.5 billion in 2015. However, if you go to the website of CoreCivic or GEO Group, there are disclaimers that they don’t contribute to policy related to immigration or sentencing. “GEO does not lobby for or against immigration enforcement policies or any policies or legislation that would determine the basis for an individual’s incarceration or detention, the length of sentences or the criminalization of behavior.” On their website, CoreCivic says, they do not lobby on “the basis for or duration of an individual’s incarceration or detention”. There are other issues that private prisons can address in their lobbying efforts: •
Where to build. Many large states have sprawling land, ripe for a prison complex. Tax incentives from legislatures can help attract builders.
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Free market to diversify services. In recent years, GEO Group and CoreCivic have purchased rehabilitation centers to earn a piece of the pie even after inmates are released.
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Lax regulation on private prisons. Private prisons are not strangers to rumors of poor conditions and unsafe environments. It is not illegal for them to support candidates who are content to look the other way.
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Public perception. Money can be put towards painting inmates and the undocumented as dangerous and unredeemable.
Although no politician positions themselves as “soft on crime”, Republicans tend to support policies that are tougher on crime (generally speaking). Additionally, Republicans support privatization as opposed to public sourcing (i.e. education, health care). So, it’s not surprising that private prisons support Republican politicians disproportionately more than Democrats. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, (as of September 21st) for profit prisons have contributed over $600,000 to Republican candidates and more than $87,000 to Democratic candidates. Regardless of the industry, many characterize the dealings of lobbyists as shady. When money changes hands to affect to the lives of millions of people, it is smart to raise an eyebrow. When those millions of people have had their rights taken away, it is smart to raise both eyebrows, to make sure we ask questions and speak up when we can.
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The Rights of the Detained By Natalie Rodriguez-Steen Business is booming for private prisons in the immigration detention market. While inmates’ rights are something that we advocate for every day, the distinction between having rights as an American citizen, and being undocumented in a xenophobic environment is a big deal. We wanted to highlight some of the differences between the rights of detainees or inmates.
Detainees
Inmates
Population
Estimated 50,165 average daily population in 2019.
Estimated 6,410,000 individuals were in prisons or jails or were on probation or parole in 2018.
Health care access/social health issues inside of facilities
ICE states that detainees receive timely care, however, there are multiple reports of inadequate medical care, some of which have resulted in death. Until recently, unaccompanied minors did not have proper access to reproductive health. There have been allegations of forced sterilization, sexual assault, and abuse inside ICE facilities.
Inmates tend to have high rates of chronic health problems and mental health issues for which they may not receive the proper medication or treatment for. Women in prisons are faced with lack of access to adequate reproductive healthcare among mental health and substance abuse issues. Issues of abuse, sexual assault, substance abuse, and lack of access to adequate mental health services are prevalent in jails and prisons
Lawyer
Until recently, public defenders were not available unless the case was regarding criminal/traffic proceedings but this has changed in some jurisdictions. Ultimately, detainees have a right to an attorney.
Right to an attorney- private or public defense depending on resources. A public defender will be appointed if defendant is found to be indigent.
Bond during proceedings
Yes (but over half of the cash bonds are denied). Detainees do have a right to same day release. In order to be released, detainees must prove they are not a danger to society or flight risk.
Yes. Some jurisdictions rely on cash bonds and/or monitoring systems for release while others have eliminated cash bonds and are focusing on new ways to decide who is eligible for release during pretrial.
Right to phone calls
Yes (Must be provided “reasonable and equitable access to telephones�). May call immigration court, family (for emergencies), state or federal courts, consular officials, legal service providers, or a government office (for proof of legal immigration)
Yes. Calls are usually monitored and recorded. In prisons, there are time limits and calls can cost money.
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Final Thoughts… This has been one of the hardest issues to write, because I’m cynical. As we write articles on lobbying and inmates’ rights, I know what they say – I have to tell you what they say. But, I also know how much money is involved, so everything is suspect.
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