#immigrant detention center

[plethoraworldatlas]

Citing ample evidence of human rights abuses in U.S. immigration detention centers, 200 advocacy groups on Thursday demanded that the Biden administration reverse course on a planned expansion of detention facilities and said President Joe Biden's "further entrenching" of the government's reliance on detaining migrants marks "an utter betrayal" of his campaign promises.

The president's signing of a spending bill last month provided $3.4 billion for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), clearing the way for the agency to make space to jail 41,500 immigrants per day in facilities across the country.

After Biden campaigned on ending the use of for-profit detention centers, said the groups, he took office at a time when fewer than 15,000 people were being held in immigration detention facilities—which gave him "a remarkable opportunity to wind down a wasteful and abusive system."

But after the president's 2023 and 2024 budget requests signaled an intention of reducing detention funding—with ICE itself recommending that numerous facilities be closed due to "critical staffing shortages that have led to safety risks and unsanitary living conditions"—Biden last year requested supplemental detention funding as commentators and Republicans in Congress hammered the administration for allowing so-called "chaos" at the U.S.-Mexico border.

"Your FY2025 budget request sought funding for 34,000 beds instead of the 25,000 sought in the two previous cycles," wrote the groups, including Amnesty International USA, the National Immigrant Justice Center (NIJC), and the Texas Civil Rights Project. "The result is unsurprising: the FY2024 spending bill you signed provides ICE $3.4 billion to jail an average of 41,500 immigrants per day, historically high funding surpassing all four years of the Trump administration."

...

Biden signed the spending bill two weeks after Charles Daniel, a 61-year-old migrant from Trinidad and Tobago, died at a detention center operated by the private contractor GEO Group after being held in solitary confinement for four years. ICE has placed people in solitary confinement over 14,000 times in the last five years, according to PHR, for an average of 27 days each; U.N. experts say exceeding 15 days in solitary confinement constitutes torture.

[tearsofrefugees]

The Latin Times

[nando161mando]

First details emerge of rapidly filling Nauru detention centre | ABC News

[usadvlottery]

Immigrant Legal Aid Policies in the United States encompass a set of regulations and initiatives designed to provide legal assistance and support to individuals navigating the complex immigration system. These policies aim to ensure that immigrants, regardless of their status, have access to fair representation, information, and resources. Legal aid organizations collaborate with government agencies, pro bono attorneys, and community partners to offer services such as legal consultations, representation in immigration court proceedings, and advocacy for the protection of immigrants' rights. These policies reflect the commitment to upholding the principles of justice, fairness, and inclusive, recognizing the importance of a robust legal framework to address the diverse needs of the immigrant population in the United States.

[minglana]

op making the borders post unrebloggable..... maybe if you didnt want people to contradict you you shouldve kept ur opinions to urself lmao

[coochiequeens]

“ in 2020 found that some immigrant women held by U.S. immigration officials at a Georgia detention center likely underwent "unnecessary" invasive gynecological procedures, according to a report released Tuesday.”

Washington — A congressional investigation into medical abuse allegations that garnered national attention in 2020 found that some immigrant women held by U.S. immigration officials at a Georgia detention center likely underwent "unnecessary" invasive gynecological procedures, according to a report released Tuesday.

The 18-month bipartisan investigation by the Senate's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations reviewed allegations that women detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) at the Irwin County Detention Center in Ocilla, Georgia had endured medical neglect, lax coronavirus mitigation policies and questionable procedures, including hysterectomies. 

The allegations first surfaced in an explosive Sept. 2020 whistleblower complaint by Dawn Wooten, who worked as a nurse at the Ocilla detention facility. 

The investigation's 108-page report is set to be formally presented by Georgia Democratic Senator Jon Ossoff, the chair of the subcommittee, later on Tuesday during a hearing in which officials from ICE, the Homeland Security Inspector General and LaSalle Corrections, the private company operating the Ocilla facility, are set to testify following testimony from Wooten as well as a former immigrant detainee and physicians.

Tuesday's report said investigators did not corroborate "allegations of mass hysterectomies." But investigators said they did find "serious issues" regarding medical procedures and policies at the Georgia facility and the conduct of Mahendra Amin, a doctor whom Irwin County detainees accused in 2020 of performing questionable medical procedures, including, in some cases, without the patients' full consent.

The Biden administration in May 2021 ordered ICE to stop holding immigrants at the Irwin County facility as part of an effort to reform immigration detention. ICE did not immediately respond to a request to comment on the subcommittee's findings. CBS News also reached out to representatives for Amin and LaSalle Corrections, which still runs the Ocilla facility under a contract with the U.S. Marshals Service.

Citing a medical review it commissioned of over 16,600 pages of medical records pertaining to 94 women treated by Amin, the congressional subcommittee concluded that "female detainees appear to have undergone excessive, invasive, and often unnecessary gynecological procedures."

Dr. Peter Cherouny, the obstetrician-gynecologist tasked with reviewing the women's medical records, said Amin's approach to surgical procedures was "too aggressive," investigators said. Cherouny found Amin's care to be antiquated, calling it "pretty good medicine for the 1980s, but we're not there anymore."

"Dr. Cherouny explained that 40 patient records—of the 94 examined—indicated the patients had benign ovarian cysts removed by Dr. Amin, despite the fact that benign ovarian cysts 'generally resolve without surgical intervention,'" the report said.

Cherouny, the report noted, said the risks associated with these surgeries include infection, bleeding, pain and even infertility.

The report said six formerly detained women told investigators that Amin was "rough and insensitive" during medical procedures and failed to be forthcoming about his diagnoses and treatment plans. 

"These women described feeling confused, afraid, and violated after their treatment by Dr. Amin," investigators said. "Several reported that they still live with physical pain and uncertainty regarding the effect of his treatments on their fertility."

The subcommittee called Amin a "a clear outlier" in the number and types of gynecological procedures he performed on ICE detainees. "Ultimately, the Subcommittee's investigation found that Dr. Amin performed just two hysterectomies, one in 2017 and one in 2019, which ICE deemed to be medically necessary," the report said. "However, the Subcommittee did find that Dr. Amin performed an unusually high number of  other gynecological procedures on ICDC detainees."

While the Irwin County detention center held 4% of women in ICE custody between 2017 and 2020, the report said, Amin performed over 80% of certain gynecological procedures on detainees across the U.S. during that time, including laparoscopies, Depo-Provera injections, limited pelvic exams and dilation and curettage procedures.

According to the report, investigators tried to interview Amin, but their requests for voluntary testimony were denied. After the subcommittee issued a subpoena for his testimony, Amin, through his lawyer, said he "declined to provide testimony pursuant to his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination."

Investigators said Amin was under criminal investigation by the federal government as of earlier this year. A separate internal investigation by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and a federal lawsuit related to medical procedures for immigrants held at the Irwin County facility remain ongoing, the subcommittee said.

Tuesday's report found that ICE does not have a policy of securing immigrants' consent for medical procedures conducted outside of facilities overseen by the agency. ICE officials, the report said, "stated to the Subcommittee that it is the sole professional obligation of the off-site provider to obtain informed consent from patients."

The investigation also uncovered 659 reports from detainees who described "delayed or deficient medical care" at the Irwin County detention center between 2018 and 2020. Investigators said ICE and LaSalle Corrections, the private company that oversees the Georgia detention facility, "failed to take effective corrective action" to address the grievances.

Moreover, the report raised questions about ICE's vetting and oversight procedures for medical providers. The subcommittee said ICE was not aware of several malpractice claims against Amin and other physicians or a federal lawsuit against him before the Sept. 2020 whistleblower complaint.

Investigators noted that Amin was not board certified, and had been sued in 2013 by officials in Georgia and the Justice Department, who claimed he committed Medicaid fraud by "ordering unnecessary and excessive medical procedures." The case was settled in 2015, with Amin and his codefendants paying $520,000, but not admitting any wrongdoing, the report said.

[egoschwank]

al things considered — when i post my masterpiece #1162

first posted in facebook march 4, 2023

leslie sills -- "detention" (2020)

"some works [in this exhibition] decry the trump administration’s policy of separating children from their families at the mexican border. in 'detention,' a painting with collage that could be a fairy tale illustration, leslie sills portrays children asleep or fretting amid a sea of red cross blankets" ... cate mcquaid

"this is where i remain. while i explore the quotidian and celebrate it wholeheartedly, i am attuned as well to world crises and its victims. with compassion and empathy, i seek to portray those in need. in this way i see art as an agent for change, one that can enlighten the viewing public, make them think, and hopefully act accordingly" ... leslie sills

"i was standing on a ladder outside the homestead juvenile immigrant detention center outside miami, looking over the fence, and i saw children lined up like prisoners. they had been separated from their families and put in this private detention facility. it was horrible" ... kamala harris

"good night ... sleep tight ... don't let the dead bugs bite" ... al janik

[plethoraworldatlas]

The Office of Inspector General for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (OIG) published a report last month finding that nearly one-third of medical procedures performed on immigrants in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody were not properly authorized.

The report found that ICE improperly authorized 32% of major surgeries performed on individuals in ICE detention without having gone through the proper procedure first. Due to ICE’s improper authorization, the OIG audit could not verify whether the surgeries were medically necessary. The report also suggests that the forced hysterectomies performed by medical staff to women detained at the Irwin Detention Center in Georgia were not isolated incidents.

One of the issues noted in the report was that approval for these medical procedures was not given by the appropriate medical staff. According to the report, the ICE Health Service Corp (IHSC), which provides medical services to people in ICE detention, requires major surgeries to be authorized by certain personnel with a specific level of training and expertise. They must have a medical degree or equivalent and at least three years of medical training leading to board eligibility or certification that distinguishes them from other medical practitioners.

The OIG’s review of a sample of 227 surgery reports found that in only 72 of them, the surgeries were approved by the appropriate level of personnel, such as nurses or nurse practitioners.

[truechatinc]

The United States is expecting to double the volume of people crossing the southern border, but we are lacking a plan to manage this new influx of immigrants. Justin and Lance discuss how democrats and republicans are approaching this issue and discuss potential solutions to the border crisis. tags: tsou, justin weller, lance jackson, Illegal immigration, Southern border, Border crisis, Immigration policy, Border security, Humanitarian crisis, Immigration reform, Detention centers, Asylum seekers, Border patrol, Immigration enforcement, Immigration legislation

[sissa-arrows]

A British Algerian man (teacher), Farid Hamrat, came in France to help one of his friends.

He called a taxi and waited for it but instead of a taxi he got the police pointing guns at him and roughly handling him before arresting him without telling him why. He asked why and at first they tell him “For god’s sake you were looking at a synagogue!” (apparently if you’re Arab you can’t look at synagogue it’s a terror threat?!). They took him to a detention center for illegal immigrants where he eventually learned that the street where he was waiting for his taxi had a Jewish school (not a synagogue) so two French Jewish saw him thought he was wearing a keffiyeh (it looked like one but wasn’t one but honestly it doesn’t matter even if it was one straight from Palestine that’s ridiculous) and immediately called the police saying “A suspicious man dressed and behaving like a terrorists” was near the school.

So like I said they arrested him on his very first day in France. He was stripped completely naked to search him and they took pictures of him naked specifically his genitalia. They kept him in police custody illegally, letting him go after 4 days but telling him he had to stay in France for his trial (he still didn’t know what exactly he was accused of… being an Arab who wears a black and white scarf in winter near a Jewish school is not illegal). The judge eventually cancels everything saying it’s stupid and that Farid didn’t do anything wrong so the arrest isn’t justified. Farid goes back to the detention center to take back his stuff.

They refused to give him back his passport. If he wants his passport he has to sign a paper saying he entered France illegally (he didn’t he has a British passport he can come for 90 days without problems but I guess it applies only to white people not to brown Arabs) and that he is a threat to public security. Basically he has to sign a paper saying he is a potential terrorist to get his passport back.

The instrumentalisation of antisemitism isn’t helping anyone. It’s actually a threat for Jewish people as it means people are less likely to take real antisemitism into account or even to recognize it. One day we will have to address the instrumentalisation of antisemitism to be anti-Arab cause it’s honestly starting to get on my nerves.

Source

[fandomtrumpshate]

FTH 2024: Supported Nonprofit Organizations

Here are the nonprofit organizations that will be supported by this year's FTH auction. Many of these orgs will be familiar from last year's list, but we've cycled in some new groups as well. In particular, because it's a major election year in the US, we've brought in (or brought back) organations focusing on voter enfranchisement.

If you are a FTH creator and you want to ask your bidders to support an organization that’s not on the list, please read our policy on outside organizations here.

Bellingcat *

Bellingcat is an independent investigative collective of researchers, investigators and citizen journalists brought together by a passion for open source research in the public interest.

Civil Rights Education and Enforcement Center *

The Civil Rights Education and Enforcement Center (CREEC) is a nonprofit legal organization that fights for liberation and equity through the lens of intersectional disability justice.

In Our Own Voice: National Black Women’s Reproductive Justice Agenda *

A national-state partnership focused on lifting up the voices of Black women leaders at the national and regional levels in our fight to secure Reproductive Justice for all women, girls, and gender-expansive individuals, NBWRJA delivers proactive advocacy and policy solutions to address issues at the intersections of race, gender, class, sexual orientation and gender identity.

Life After Hate

LAH provides support to people leaving hate groups, and providing pluralism education and training to vulnerable young people.

Middle East Children's Alliance *

MECA is a nonprofit organization working for the rights and the well-being of children in the Middle East. They collect funds in order to provide direct aid, financial support for community projects, water purification systems, and university scholarships, and also create educational and cultural programs in the US and internationally to increase cultural understanding.

National Network to End Domestic Violence *

NNEDV offers a range of programs and initiatives to address the complex causes and far-reaching consequences of domestic violence.

Never Again Action *

A Jewish-led mobilization against the persecution, detention, and deportation of immigrants in the United States, NAA takes on campaigns against detention centers and ICE training programs, and organizes mutual aid and deportation defense.

Razom *

Razom initiates short and long-term projects, or collaborates on existing projects with partner organizations, which help Ukraine stay on the path of fostering democracy and prosperity

Sherlock’s Homes Foundation *

SHF provides housing, employment opportunities, and a loving support system for homeless LGBTQ+ young adults so that they can live fearlessly as their authentic selves. Within these homes, young adults learn about responsibility, accountability, financial independence, life skills, and how to love themselves

Spread the Vote

STV helps eligible voters make their voices heard through voter education, supporting voters through the process of getting necessary ID, and advocating against voter suppression laws.

Violence Policy Center *

VPC works to stop gun death and injury through research, education, advocacy, and collaboration; exposes the profit-driven marketing and lobbying activities of the firearms industry and gun lobby, and offers unique technical expertise to policymakers, organizations, and advocates.

VoteRiders

VR works to help all citizens exercise their right to vote. It informs and helps citizens to secure their voter ID as well as inspires and supports organizations, local volunteers, and communities to sustain voter ID education and assistance efforts.

Umbrella: Environmental orgs

For the past four years, FTH has supported one “umbrella” cause: we invite participants to donate to their own local grassroots organization, while also suggesting a handful of exemplary organizations working in communities where the need is especially acute. This year our umbrella category is environmental organizations.

Pollinator Partnership *

Deploy/Us *

Together Bay Area

Wildlands Restoration Volunteers

Coral Restoration Foundation *

++

Organizations marked with an asterisk (*) allow for international donations directly through their websites. The orgs without asterisks may take international donations through a paypal or venmo account. If you are a non-US-based bidder/donor and you are having trouble finding an organization to which you can donate, please email us directly at fandomtrumpshate @ gmail . com.

[probablyasocialecologist]

Captivity is a constitutive part of Palestinian life under occupation. Prior to Hamas’s attack on October 7th, Israel incarcerated more than 5,200 Palestinians—most of them residents of the West Bank and East Jerusalem—across two dozen prisons and detention centers. Some West Bank residents are incarcerated due to a still-operant military order issued following the 1967 War that effectively criminalized civic activities (e.g. gatherings of more than ten people without a permit, distributing political materials, displaying flags) as “incitement and hostile propaganda actions.” There are currently hundreds of such military orders, which criminalize anything that might be construed as resistance to the occupation. This surfeit of activities made illegal for Palestinians authorizes mass imprisonment: According to a recent estimate by the United Nations, one million Palestinians have at one time been incarcerated by Israel, “including tens of thousands of children.” One in five Palestinians, and two in five Palestinian men, have been arrested at some point in their lives, and, as of 2021, more than 100 Palestinian children faced up to 20 years in prison for throwing stones.

Not all who are arrested face charges. Israel often and increasingly makes use of “administrative detention,” a relic of the British Mandate era, which allows for indefinite incarceration without a charge or trial, ostensibly for the purpose of gathering evidence. It was a hallmark of apartheid South Africa and has been used to repress opposition in Egypt, England, India, the United States, and elsewhere, especially in the context of anti-immigration and “counter-terrorism” programs. “Since March 2002, not a single month has gone by without Israel holding at least 100 Palestinians in administrative detention,” the Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem notes; often the number is much higher. Prior to October 7th, more than 20% of Palestinian prisoners were administrative detainees; 233 of the 300 Palestinians on Israel’s release list negotiated last week were administrative detainees, Al Jazeera noted. According to the Palestinian prisoner organization Addameer, imprisoned Palestinians report being beaten, threatened, strip searched, and denied healthcare and contact with their families. Palestinians currently incarcerated, as well as those freed in recent days, report that conditions have worsened since October 7th. Meanwhile, even as this prisoner release proceeds, Israel continues to ramp up arrests: As of Tuesday, 180 Palestinian prisoners have been released as part of the ceasefire exchange, but during the same period, it arrested Palestinians at nearly the same rate. Today, more than 7,000 Palestinians are incarcerated in Israeli prisons.

Nowhere is Israel’s carceral regime clearer than in Gaza, the 140-square-mile area often described as an “open-air prison.” Gaza’s residents, now an estimated 2.2 million people—80% of whom are refugees or descendents of refugees forced to flee in the mass expulsions surrounding the founding of the State of Israel that Palestinians call the Nakba—have been hemmed in by a land, air, and sea blockade since 2006. As with Palestinians incarcerated in Israeli prisons, who for years have waged hunger strikes, protested, and written about the horrors of incarceration, Gazans have struggled mightily against their confinement. In 2018–19, they held weekly nonviolent protests at the border under the name Great March of Return. Israel responded with brutal violence, killing 260 people and wounding 20,000 others, many of whom were permanently disabled. A week into Israel’s current assault on Gaza, Ahmed Abu Artema, one of the co-founders of the Great March of Return, wrote an impassioned plea in The Nation, calling for the world to “help us tear down the wall, end our imprisonment, and fulfill our dreams of liberation.” On October 24th, an Israeli airstrike severely wounded Artema and killed five members of his family, including his 13-year-old son.

It is precisely in such contexts of radical asymmetry that we find the history of hostage-taking: In the last half-century, under-resourced combatants from Palestine to Brazil to the United States and beyond have used hostages to gain political leverage. Militants, whose own lives are not valued by the powers they face, capture those whose lives they assume are deemed more valuable. This strategy often succeeds in shifting the terms of the conversation—asserting the previously dismissed hostage-takers as political actors whose demands must be negotiated. But the same dynamic that leads militants to take hostages is why the tactic so often fails: The prison state fundamentally devalues life, and ultimately may sacrifice hostages to preserve its rule. Israeli officials have said as much. “We have to be cruel now and not think too much about the hostages,” finance minister Bezalel Smotrich said in a cabinet meeting as Israel launched its war.

[leftistfeminista]

'I Won't Stop Until Israel Admits Its Ties With the Pinochet Regime'

Lily Traubman, who immigrated to Israel in the 1970s, hopes the documents she is trying to get from the Defense Ministry and the Foreign Ministry may even contain information on her father's killers.

A year ago there were headlines when four women filed a suit for sexual abuse they suffered in prison during the Pinochet period. They demanded that the abuse be recognized as a political crime and that their torturers be brought to trial. Were such attacks something that was directed from above?

Of course. Have you heard of “La Venda Sexy”? It was a detention center where people were tortured. The name actually means “Sexy Blindfold,” because the detainees’ eyes were covered the whole time and they were subjected to sexual abuse.

All the detainees were blindfolded the whole time?

Yes. They were arrested, blindfolded and put into a room, together, with their eyes covered. Then they were tortured. Most of the female detainees were raped and underwent sexual abuse. A girlfriend of mine was held there but was not raped. She told me she’d felt fortunate, but then came New Year’s and she was raped. They’d kept her for the holiday.

Venda Sexy was truly awful. They had dogs that were trained to rape women, and they would force spouses and family members to watch the rape. More and more testimonies about these abuses come out all the time.

And throughout this whole period, Israel, under prime ministers Yitzhak Rabin, Menachem Begin and Shimon Peres, maintained excellent relations with Chile. The two countries supported each other in the United Nations and signed bilateral agreements. Army Chief of Staff Mordechai Gur visited Chile in 1978, as did Deputy Prime Minister David Levy in 1982. Both met with Pinochet.

Pinochet was even invited to the synagogue in Santiago on Yom Kippur. Other presidents were not invited.

The documents declassified by the Americans also contain references to arms deals with Israel. Secretary of State George Shultz noted in a 1984 document that Britain, France, Israel and Germany were Chile’s arms suppliers.

All the weapons of the Chilean police and army were Israeli. In Chile I went around with a photograph of my brother in uniform. At checkpoints and in searches I would take out the picture and tell them that this was my brother, who was an officer in the IDF – even though he was a regular soldier – and that did the trick. The Chilean army greatly admired the Israeli army. When Pinochet wanted to visit Israel, he threatened that if he were not received here he would cancel a large arms deal. No dictator in the world, however bad he may be, can exist without international support. The dictatorship in Chile lasted as long as it did because there were countries that supported it, and Israel was one of them.

Israel describes itself as “the state of the Jewish people,” but there are about 20 missing Jews in Chile who were murdered during that period, while Israeli governments and the military maintained close ties with Chile, accorded it legitimization in international forums and provided aid and training to its military and intelligence units.

[autisticadvocacy]

"LGBTQ and HIV-positive people locked up in immigration detention centers are experiencing high rates of sexual assault, harassment and threats, according to a report released last month."