An Open Letter (7/4/19)

The following letter was sent to the offices of Senators Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth as well as Representative Jesus "Chuy" Garcia on July 3rd concerning the DHS Inspector General's report on CBP detention facilities in the Rio Grande Valley.)

Good afternoon. I recently had a chance to read the DHS Inspector General's report _Management Alert: DHS Needs to Address Dangerous Overcrowding and Prolonged Detention of Children and Adults in the Rio Grande Valley_ and was deeply disturbed by the conditions described in the report.

The repeated accounts of crisis-level overcrowding, poor sanitation, inadequate access to showers and hot food are disturbing enough in themselves, but the fact that the CBP's leadership attempted to deflect this criticism with a response that essentially says "this is the best we can do, given the circumstances" is no real comfort either. The CBP'S role is to detain illegal border crossers and then process them out to ICE within 72 hours of apprehension, not hold them in the equivalent of a overcrowded prison for weeks on end without processing. The fact that a good portion of these _de facto_ inmates are minors is equally disturbing. Likewise, the fact that I saw no mention of detainees being segregated according to possible criminal history is disturbing; are actual detainees with known criminal records or noticeable violent tendencies being segregated from the general detainee population, especially minors and women? Are such screenings even being made in the first place?

What is needed for improvement of these conditions is not merely increased funding of these facilities but thorough oversight by Congress. The Trump administration, as usual, can seem to range from a blase attitude to outright callousness towards this situation. The fact that they would prefer to bring tanks into Washington for an almost Soviet-style "salute to America" instead of working on comprehensive immigration reform speaks volumes about the administration's real priorities. It's apparently up to Congress to initiate positive steps to fix this issue. Please do your part in doing just that.

Thank you.