cross-posted from: https://infosec.pub/post/47533671
There’s a lot of profit in paying immigrants a dollar a day to run their own jail—until they refuse.
It has now been almost two weeks since the laborers keeping ICE’s Delaney Hall mega-jail open went on strike—demanding a chance to speak with New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill, reviews of their cases, and ultimately, their freedom. Those workers are the detainees themselves, who serve as custodians, line cooks, hairdressers, laundry workers, and janitors at the Newark prison-turned-detention center where a thousand people are trapped in DHS custody, working for wages as low as a dollar per day.
What began as a simultaneous hunger and labor strike has become largely a labor struggle, organizers with the immigrant rights group Cosecha New Jersey told me. That strike, according to a letter signed by 46 detained people and published June 3, is near-unanimous and ongoing: “people detained have all voluntarily stopped working and assisting with facility operations,” they wrote in a May 31 letter titled “We Demand Freedom.”
The for-profit firm GEO Group, ICE’s largest private contractor and Delaney Hall’s operator, runs what it calls a “voluntary work program” that in effect keeps the center operating, described in a recent GEO Group detainee handbook reviewed by Mother Jones.
“Any resident assigned to work in the kitchen will be paid $4.00 per day,” the handbook says. That’s the highest wage anyone gets: “Laundry Work Details and Barbershop Workers will be paid $3.00 per day. Special Work Details are paid $2.00 per day. All other job assignments are $1.00 per day. Ordinarily you will not be permitted to work more than eight hours per day or 40 hours per week.”
The document also lists the cost of a pair of shoes at GEO Group’s commissary: $24.28, equivalent to several weeks’ wages. A blanket costs eight dollars. ID cards, which detained people must pay to replace if damaged, cost $5 each, or a full week’s pay.
While the work program is labeled as voluntary, “encouraging others to participate in a work stoppage or to refuse to work” is listed in the detainee handbook as a “high offense,” punishable by disciplinary transfer, isolation, or initiating criminal proceedings.
“Engaging in, or inciting a group demonstration” is also a “high offense” and “prohibited act.” And, the detained strikers wrote in their June 3 letter, they have been “subjected to reprisals, discrimination, mockery, mistreatment, and threats” since their strike began.
Also of note in the article (emphasis mine):
The profit margins of facilities like Delaney Hall depend on coercing people into working for otherwise illegal rates, Andrew Free, an immigration lawyer and journalist who researches conditions in ICE detention, said. “The way you keep the place clean is you use the people who are inside to clean it.”
Those dollar-a-day rates have held since 1950, when they were established by Congress. It was keyed to the “international standard for prisoners of war under the Geneva Conventions, which was three Swiss francs.”
And,
But it’s generally cheaper to let people go than to transfer strikers to different facilities, Free said. So when some detained people are released—like an 18-year-old who was freed from Delaney Hall earlier this week after missing her high school prom—“that is just as much a predictable consequence of these hunger and labor strikes as the repression and retaliation.”
Is there a strike fund? A strike fund might even pay these detainees more than their slave wages.
Ways to Help
Share Information on the Strike and Protests
One of the first steps is to make more people aware of the situation and the realities of concentration camps in America. Spread information with your community and social circles.
Demand Media Attention
While New York and Los Angeles local outlets have run stories on these strikes, neither has quite attracted a national groundswell, and thus far little of the coverage has acknowledged that these aren’t isolated incidents. (There have been previous hunger strikes in the concentration camp archipelago,** including at the North Lake Processing Facility in Michigan last month.) Let’s urge them to cover the protests.
- Submit a tip to the Associated Press
- Submit a tip to the New York Times
- Contact the newsroom of the Washington Post
- Submit a tip to CNN
- Submit a news tip to NBC News
- Submit a tip to ABC News
- Submit a tip to CBS News
Demand and Plan Action
We’ve seen multiple members of Congress show up to Delaney Hall for inspections this weekend, but the Adelanto strike hasn’t gotten nearly as much attention, and there are still far too many of our elected officials who have refused to use their power to shine a light on what’s happening inside the camps. Especially if we’re from Southern California, New York or New Jersey, let’s reach out to our reps and demand they visit the hunger strikers. We can also tell them that it would be obscene to deliver billions more to ICE and CBP while they refuse to improve conditions in detention, and they must vote against the reconciliation bill. And more importanly, plan other methods of support.
Sample Call Members of Congress:
Find your representative here!
Hello, my name is _________ and I am calling to urge [your representative name] to make a visit to the Adelanto Detention Center & Desert View Annex to support the hunger strikers. On May 19th, 20 men launched a hunger strike over the inhumane conditions and lack of medical care inside the facility. As a result, these courageous individuals have undertaken this strike out of the need to have their rights and dignity be respected. As a member of Congress, we urge you to make a visit to Adelanto & Desert View and meet with the hunger strikers to support their demands. Thank you.
Sample Email for Members of Congress:
Find your representative here!
Hello, my name is _________ and I am a resident of [Insert your city]. I am contacting [your representative name] over the recent hunger strike launched by men at the Desert View Annex. This hunger strike was launched as a result of the inhumane, cruel conditions that many individuals inside Adelanto and Desert View Annex are facing. From inedible food to non-existent medical care - these claims were all verified in a recent report by the California Attorney General. As a member of Congress, you have the authority to visit and enter these detention facilities. We urge you to set up a visit to Adelanto and Desert View to take note of the horrendous conditions and meet with the hunger strikers to support their demands. Thank you
Provide Financial Support
We can donate to commissary accounts
- Adelanto Commissary Funds
- Delaney Hall Commissary Funds
- Donate to help CLUE Justice bond out folks in detention
Show Up
Provide active resistance in real life.
There’s a lot of profit in paying immigrants a dollar a day to run their own jail—until they refuse.
It has now been almost two weeks since the laborers keeping ICE’s Delaney Hall mega-jail open went on strike—demanding a chance to speak with New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill, reviews of their cases, and ultimately, their freedom. Those workers are the detainees themselves, who serve as custodians, line cooks, hairdressers, laundry workers, and janitors at the Newark prison-turned-detention center where a thousand people are trapped in DHS custody, working for wages as low as a dollar per day.
What began as a simultaneous hunger and labor strike has become largely a labor struggle, organizers with the immigrant rights group Cosecha New Jersey told me. That strike, according to a letter signed by 46 detained people and published June 3, is near-unanimous and ongoing: “people detained have all voluntarily stopped working and assisting with facility operations,” they wrote in a May 31 letter titled “We Demand Freedom.”
The for-profit firm GEO Group, ICE’s largest private contractor and Delaney Hall’s operator, runs what it calls a “voluntary work program” that in effect keeps the center operating, described in a recent GEO Group detainee handbook reviewed by Mother Jones.
“Any resident assigned to work in the kitchen will be paid $4.00 per day,” the handbook says. That’s the highest wage anyone gets: “Laundry Work Details and Barbershop Workers will be paid $3.00 per day. Special Work Details are paid $2.00 per day. All other job assignments are $1.00 per day. Ordinarily you will not be permitted to work more than eight hours per day or 40 hours per week.”
The document also lists the cost of a pair of shoes at GEO Group’s commissary: $24.28, equivalent to several weeks’ wages. A blanket costs eight dollars. ID cards, which detained people must pay to replace if damaged, cost $5 each, or a full week’s pay.
While the work program is labeled as voluntary, “encouraging others to participate in a work stoppage or to refuse to work” is listed in the detainee handbook as a “high offense,” punishable by disciplinary transfer, isolation, or initiating criminal proceedings.
“Engaging in, or inciting a group demonstration” is also a “high offense” and “prohibited act.” And, the detained strikers wrote in their June 3 letter, they have been “subjected to reprisals, discrimination, mockery, mistreatment, and threats” since their strike began.
