Dignity Not Detention Coalition: Biden admin kills popular CA law to end private detention

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For immediate release: Oct 5, 2021

Breaking: Biden admin kills popular CA law to end private detention 

Admin’s decision to continue Trump-era lawsuit shows slide into Trumpism on immigration policy

Unjust ruling will keep systematically abusive detention centers open in California, put lives at risk

Pasadena, CA - Today, a panel of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals directed the District court to block California’s AB 32, a state law signed in 2019 which banned private prisons and private immigration detention centers in the state. This same federal district court judge, Janis Sammartino, had largely upheld the law last year, but a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit - including two Trump appointees - reversed that decision today. The State of California now has the option of either appealing the decision to a larger “en banc” panel of judges on the Ninth Circuit or asking the U.S. Supreme Court to take the case. 

The court’s flawed ruling comes as the number of immigrants in ICE detention has skyrocketed under the Biden administration. Prior to the ruling, several ICE detention centers in California had been expected to close in the coming years when their contracts expired. If left intact, today’s ruling would allow these detention centers, which have a long track record of serious abuse, to remain open. The Biden administration’s decision to pursue the Trump-era lawsuit sparked anger from advocates as well as a letter from 25 Members of Congress expressing “serious concern.” 

In response to today’s ruling, the Dignity not Detention Coalition, which led efforts to pass AB 32, issued the following statement:

The Biden administration’s horrific abuse of Haitian migrants in Del Rio late last month has shown that the administration has betrayed clear promises and violated core values by putting the lives of immigrant community members at risk. We continue to demand an immediate end to deportations and that humanitarian parole be granted. 

Meanwhile, today’s ruling on AB 32, brought about by the administration’s decision to continue a Trump-era lawsuit, is another grim marker of the administration’s descent into Trumpian immigration policy.  

In this painful moment, we demand that the Biden administration and Congress take immediate action to repair the harm wrought today, including decreasing funding for abusive detention and reinvesting in proven, community-based alternatives. The long record of medical neglect and systemic abuses plaguing detention -- and the anti-Blackness and racism deeply embedded in the system-- must not be swept under the rug. 

Today’s ruling is a stark lesson about the threat unchecked corporate power poses to the democratic process. Yet AB 32 is one tactic in a large quest for justice. People who are currently in detention and their loved ones continue to organize for freedom and dignity every day.  We must answer the call of solidarity and redouble our efforts to end all detention, whether run by a corporation or the government. 

As the dissenting Judge on the 9th circuit panel, Judge Murguia, noted, it is well within the state’s powers to safeguard the health and safety of Californians, including people suffering in detention.  Legal experts are available for comment today. 

California previously set limits on local governments contracting with ICE to run detention facilities, and only one locally-run ICE detention center exists in the state. Those laws, passed in 2017, remain in full effect and are not part of this lawsuit. 

Background:  Pushed by a grassroots movement and signed in October 2019, AB 32 went into effect on January 1, 2020. Since contracts for three of the four private ICE detention centers in the state were set to expire in March 2020, the facilities would have closed prior to the onset of COVID-19, which hit detention centers across the state due to ICE’s well-documented medical neglect.

But days before AB 32 went into effect in December 2019, ICE inked new contracts to keep the California detention centers open and expand detention into facilities which California had been leasing from one of the corporations, The GEO group. The contracts drew condemnation from Members of Congress. Days later, GEO filed a lawsuit against AB 32, followed by the Trump administration. 

In October 2020, District Court Judge Janis Sammartino, a George W. Bush appointee, issued a ruling largely upholding AB32. Yet the Biden administration chose to continue the Trump administration’s lawsuit and appeal the decision. 

ICE systematically deprives thousands of immigrants of liberty each day, with anti-Black racism, medical neglect, in-custody deaths, and abuses rampant even prior to COVID-19.  Advocates have long argued that whether run by governments or corporations, detention and incarceration are abusive and unnecessary, and that community-based alternatives are effective and life saving. 
Advocates note that outside of the immigration context, nine in ten incarcerated people are held in government-run prisons or jails. 

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The Dignity not Detention includes California Immigrant Youth Justice Alliance, Freedom for Immigrants, Immigrant Legal Resource Center (ILRC), the Services, Immigrant Rights and Education Network (SIREN), Inland Coalition for Immigrant Justice (ICIJ), Interfaith Movement for Human Integrity, and others.