22 Mothers Are Fasting Inside an Immigration Detention Center

By Esther Yu Hsi Lee, ThinkProgress

03 September 16

 

lmost two dozen immigrant mother detainees begun fasting inside a Pennsylvania detention center this week, hoping to force a harsh spotlight on the one-year detention anniversary of at least four families.

According to a letter written in Spanish that was obtained by ThinkProgress, 22 mothers at the Berks County Residential Center in Leesport began a liquid-only fast on Wednesday morning as a way to challenge the U.S. federal government to allow the release of families who have been categorically denied asylum. That form of humanitarian relief would allow immigrants to stay in the U.S. permanently without the fear of being deported back to dangerous conditions in their home countries.

“As a result of the silence and lack of action by the federal government, yesterday we resumed the strike,” the letter reads in part.

“During this strike we will not receive any food, but we will keep hydrated to preserve enough energy and health to keep fighting for our freedom and care for our children,” the mothers add.

The mothers’ liquid-only fast comes one week after they took part in a ten-day hunger strike that ended after a supervising Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) official allegedly “intimidated” them. In one instance, a Salvadoran mother was threatened with a forced transfer to another family detention center in Karnes, Texas, and officials have reportedly threatened to take away children from their mothers.

“They decided to switch to a fast so that the government could not possibly have the excuse to take away their children,” said Adanjesus Marin, the director at the immigrant rights organization Make the Road Pennsylvania, which has had direct contact with the women who are fasting.

An Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency spokesperson refuted allegations of retaliation, telling ThinkProgress that the immigrant mothers were being “actively monitored” by health officials.

“ICE fully respects the rights of all people to voice their opinion without interference,” the spokesperson wrote in an email, pointing to a 2011 protocol in place for striking detainees. “ICE does not retaliate in any way against hunger strikers. ICE explains the negative health effects of not eating to the facility’s residents. For their health and safety, ICE closely monitors the food and water intake of those identified as being on a hunger strike.”

The women and their children were among the tens of thousands of Central Americans fleeing violence, poverty, and persecution who appeared at the southern U.S. border beginning in late 2013. In response, the Obama administration placed them in family detention centers while they waited for an immigration judge to decide their fate.

The detention centers aren’t supposed to be long-term solution for housing immigrants. Earlier this month, U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said the agency was “meeting the standard” to ensure that “the average length of stay at these facilities is 20 days or less.”

But advocates for the Berks mothers say that’s not true, and many of the families have been detained well beyond the 20-day marker.

“Everyone who was on the original hunger strike have been detained anywhere between nine months to almost a year. And now, sadly, several of them?—?four or five families as of this week?—?have reached the one-year mark,” CarolAnne Donohue, an immigration lawyer based in Pennsylvania who represents some of the women, told ThinkProgress.

“They did it to draw attention to the fact that they exist?—?even though Homeland Security seems to pretend that they don’t,” she added.

Earlier this week, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit denied asylum to some of the striking mothers, saying that they were not entitled to constitutional protections afforded to everyone on U.S. soil. Advocates and lawyers who hoped that the court would support the mothers’ release to sponsors within the United States are appealing that legal ruling.

“If the decision is not overturned, it will be the first time in this country’s history that a noncitizen on U.S. soil would not have access to a federal court to challenge the legality of their removal,” Lee Gelernt, the deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Union and the director of the Access to the Courts Program and Immigrants’ Rights Project, told ThinkProgress.

“It’s become pretty obvious that they were targeting families that were part of this federal case and not giving them release,” Donohue said.

Detention facilities like Berks has come under national scrutiny recently after the U.S. Department of Justice announced that it would sunset the use of privately-operated prisons, a decision that currently does not affect immigration detention centers. Secretary Johnson has since cautiously granted a November 30 deadline to review the necessity of immigration detention centers.

To be clear, Berks is run by the county and not by private prison operators, so Johnson’s review wouldn’t affect the detention center’s viability. But there are some positive signs that family detention centers are on their way out. Last year, the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services decided not to renew the facility’s contract, citing state law prohibiting adults and minors from being housed in the same facility. And many Democratic lawmakers have called on the Obama administration to end the use of family detention.

“All family detention should end?—?there have been many reports put out about the harm inflicted based on family detention,” Donohue said, alluding to studies by Academy of Pediatrics and Human Rights Watch, showing that detention can retraumatize asylum seekers. “They need to shut it down. Every single one of those mothers have somewhere to go in the United States.”

“These women and young children fled for their lives,” Gelernt added. “They should not be viewed as criminals.”