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Eli Kantor is a labor, employment and immigration law attorney. He has been practicing labor, employment and immigration law for more than 36 years. He has been featured in articles about labor, employment and immigration law in the L.A. Times, Business Week.com and Daily Variety. He is a regular columnist for the Daily Journal. Telephone (310)274-8216; eli@elikantorlaw.com. For more information, visit beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com and and beverlyhillsemploymentlaw.com

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Thursday, March 29, 2012

Union Chief Says New U.S. Rules for Immigration Detention Are Flawed

New York Times (by Julia Preston): The leader of a union representing thousands of federal officers responsible for detaining and deporting illegal immigrants said Wednesday that new rules issued by the Obama administration for immigration detention centers nationwide were flawed and would make the system “more dangerous.”

In testimony in Washington before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration, Chris Crane, the president of Council 118 of the American Federation of Government Employees, accused administration officials of systematically excluding agents from discussions of security provisions in the new rules. The agents Mr. Crane represents are from Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which is in charge of immigration detention.

Mr. Crane said the new rules, which the agency published in February, eliminated or undercut many security procedures that were routine in other federal facilities. “New detention standards proposed by ICE are unsafe,” Mr. Crane said, using the acronym for the agency, “unsafe for detainees and unsafe for employees.”

The testimony by Mr. Crane was a new sign of a deep rift between top immigration officials, including John Morton, the director of the agency, and at least some enforcement agents on the ground, as the Obama administration makes ambitious changes in deportations policy and detention practices.

The hearing, under the title “Holiday on ICE,” was called by Republicans to air their criticisms of the new detention standards, which they regard as overly lax and wasteful.

“Under this administration, detention looks more like recess,” Representative Lamar Smith of Texas, the Republican chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said at the opening of the hearing.

Kevin Landy, assistant director for detention policy and planning at ICE, noted that the agency did not have legal powers to punish, as federal prisons do. The agency holds immigrants under civil, not criminal authorities, while they await the outcome of immigration court cases or head for deportation.

The new standards were devised to deal with failings that led in recent years to dozens of deaths of immigrants in detention, many lawsuits and critical reports from oversight officials. The standards will improve medical care and add protections against sexual abuse for detainees, Mr. Landy said, and make it easier for them to consult with lawyers.

This month, Immigration and Customs Enforcement opened a new detention center in Karnes County, Tex., that is the first one in the country designed for civil detention. It includes more freedom of movement, recreation and contact visits for immigrants held there.

The contrast between Mr. Landy and Mr. Crane was so great, it often seemed they were talking about different detention systems. Mr. Crane testified that the union had tried repeatedly over three years to participate through bargaining in internal discussions leading to the new detention policy — to no avail, he said.

He accused the Homeland Security secretary, Janet Napolitano, and Mr. Morton of negotiating in bad faith, in “the most anti-union and anti-federal law enforcement campaign we have witnessed.”

Mr. Crane said ICE had set up no national system for employees to report attacks by detainees on officers. ICE agents are also concerned, he said, that the new standards do not include criminal background screenings of visitors to detention centers.

The standards call for pat-down searches instead of more thorough strip searches, Mr. Crane testified, and they permit immigrants to observe searches by agents in the facility, allowing detainees to “learn search techniques.”

ICE officers have been asked to conduct initial medical screenings, he said, which are not within their expertise.

Mr. Crane noted that the agency had made a major shift to focus its efforts on deporting illegal immigrants convicted of crimes.

But while the proportion of criminals in detention increases, he argued, “security protocols appear to be weakening.”

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