Family detention ended after years of lawsuits, medical warnings, and public outrage. Now, it’s back—despite clear evidence that it’s harmful, costly, and ineffective. Get the full story below.
I once worked on a case during the Biden admin where the mother was separated from her 16 year old daughter in Colombia on their way up to the border. The daughter miraculously made it to the border and was in ORR waiting for her mother to find her. After maybe 6 months she was just about to be placed in foster care when I became aware of the case and the mother and her other 3 children. Even after identifying her daughter in a detention center in TX, it took another 4 months for them to be reunited because of all the bureaucratic steps in between. I'm sure there were and are shortages of social workers, but this case cemented in my mind the blasé approach the admin had to reuniting families. I'm sure this young woman will be forever traumatized. The cruelty is the point.
It's like the Border Patrol's policy of funneling migrants to the most dangerous areas to cross the border. It's meant as a deterrent. People get hurt or die, a signal to other migrants trying to cross. As you wrote, the cruelty is the point.
Family detention always leaves me speechless... with disgust, with fear, with hatred of the US, with sheer horror of what all we put these families (particularly the children) through who only want to immigrate to a safe place. Thanks for such a thorough look at this topic.
Thank you for this nuanced, detailed and compassionate historical look at family detention. I am still traumatized from my own visits to Artesia and Dilley; I can't imagine the lifelong trauma and damage suffered by these mothers and especially their children. (And thanks for suggesting listening to the audio version of this long post. I did so and I think it made it easier to digest this difficult topic.)
So so good and thank you. Dr. Benard Dreyer (whom you cite) passed away recently and is amongst the many saints who go above and beyond to protect all children. He and Dr. Alan Shapiro of Terra Firma were key to shutting down Berks, their duty as pediatricians.
With reports that the Trump administration is reviving family detention as part of a broader expansion of immigrant detention across the U.S., ICE’s focus on families and unaccompanied minors "contradicts the administration’s claims that it is focusing its limited resources on dangerous criminals"
Thanks for this informative, but sad, essay. Sorry to ask for even more from the essay but a brief explanation of what a "community-based case management program" looks like as a more humane approach would be helpful.
Thanks! Typo fixed. Case management for immigration enforcement purposes, generally means that the families are on electronic monitoring, that they have to check in with deportation officers, and that they may also receive some additional services, such as mental health counseling, that helps to facilitate their participation and follow through with whatever legal process they are going through.
Thanks. And I assume the families are living with relatives or friends or are renting a room/apartment? They would not typically be in a “facility,” correct?
That’s right! If they are in case management, they are living in the community, which means with family or relatives, possibly in a shelter, but almost certainly not in facility.
I once worked on a case during the Biden admin where the mother was separated from her 16 year old daughter in Colombia on their way up to the border. The daughter miraculously made it to the border and was in ORR waiting for her mother to find her. After maybe 6 months she was just about to be placed in foster care when I became aware of the case and the mother and her other 3 children. Even after identifying her daughter in a detention center in TX, it took another 4 months for them to be reunited because of all the bureaucratic steps in between. I'm sure there were and are shortages of social workers, but this case cemented in my mind the blasé approach the admin had to reuniting families. I'm sure this young woman will be forever traumatized. The cruelty is the point.
It's like the Border Patrol's policy of funneling migrants to the most dangerous areas to cross the border. It's meant as a deterrent. People get hurt or die, a signal to other migrants trying to cross. As you wrote, the cruelty is the point.
Family detention always leaves me speechless... with disgust, with fear, with hatred of the US, with sheer horror of what all we put these families (particularly the children) through who only want to immigrate to a safe place. Thanks for such a thorough look at this topic.
Thank you for this nuanced, detailed and compassionate historical look at family detention. I am still traumatized from my own visits to Artesia and Dilley; I can't imagine the lifelong trauma and damage suffered by these mothers and especially their children. (And thanks for suggesting listening to the audio version of this long post. I did so and I think it made it easier to digest this difficult topic.)
So so good and thank you. Dr. Benard Dreyer (whom you cite) passed away recently and is amongst the many saints who go above and beyond to protect all children. He and Dr. Alan Shapiro of Terra Firma were key to shutting down Berks, their duty as pediatricians.
Really! That's sad but it sounds like a life well-lived.
With reports that the Trump administration is reviving family detention as part of a broader expansion of immigrant detention across the U.S., ICE’s focus on families and unaccompanied minors "contradicts the administration’s claims that it is focusing its limited resources on dangerous criminals"
Thanks for this informative, but sad, essay. Sorry to ask for even more from the essay but a brief explanation of what a "community-based case management program" looks like as a more humane approach would be helpful.
Thanks! Typo fixed. Case management for immigration enforcement purposes, generally means that the families are on electronic monitoring, that they have to check in with deportation officers, and that they may also receive some additional services, such as mental health counseling, that helps to facilitate their participation and follow through with whatever legal process they are going through.
Thanks. And I assume the families are living with relatives or friends or are renting a room/apartment? They would not typically be in a “facility,” correct?
That’s right! If they are in case management, they are living in the community, which means with family or relatives, possibly in a shelter, but almost certainly not in facility.