Dignity Not Detention New Mexico is a movement that supports HB624 the Rubio-Maestas Immigration Detention Facilities Act which seeks to achieve three primary objectives for the land of enchantment:
- halt the opening of new ICE detention facilities
- prevent the expansion of existing ICE detention facilities
- implement immediate independent executive and community oversight of existing ICE detention facilities until they expire and close.
Immigration detention exists for the sole purpose of holding migrants to ensure they are present for their immigration proceedings. DHS and ICE are clear that no one held in immigration detention is being confined for having committed a crime. Yet the US Commission on Civil Rights describes immigration detention as “torture like conditions.” With more than 44,000 individuals on any one day presently held in detention and more than 300,000 individuals per year passing through the detention system, ICE immigration detention costs the United States over $3 billion annually and growing. DHS’s own documentation shows that alternatives to detention are effective because very few people abscond. ICE’s existing alternatives to detention are more humane and cost a 1/10th of confinement. Moreover, incarceration facilities don’t bring stable good paying jobs to rural counties. Private prison contractors often leave rural areas in debt, and jailing migrants isn’t an effective development strategy. New Mexicans have had enough, its time to end immigration detention in the state. Following California’s 2017 passage of similar legislature, we call for Dignity Not Detention in New Mexico through the passage of HB624 the Rubio-Maestas Immigration Detention Facilities Act. Please read over the bill and consider signing on.