Thread by @RAICESTEXAS

There's a lot of talk & uncertainty around "Emergency Reception Centers" for children like Carrizo Springs & Homestead opening up again under the Biden Administration.

So let's walk through what all of this actually means for immigrant children at our border.

A thread 🧵⤵️

This move represents a chilling continuity of Trump's attitudes towards immigrants & reinforces the notion that immigrants—including unaccompanied children—are less than human & should be warehoused away from the general population instead of being reunited w/relatives in the US.

FACT: The facilities run by @HHSGov & the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) ARE better than those run by ICE or CBP.

CAVEAT: The Trump Admin showed us that the HHS/ORR system could be weaponized against immigrants.

Think family separation under the Zero Tolerance policy.

How did this happen, you ask?

1⃣ These "emergency" centers provided the gov't with the ability to separate families by providing a safe place to send the separated children to, with the excuse that they were far better off there than with their parents/guardians.

2⃣The HHS/OOR system shared info given to them by the children in their custody (about their potential sponsors in the U.S.) with ICE, who then used that information to conduct enforcement activities a.k.a. deporting people.

We're not saying the Biden Admin will follow 45's footsteps, but the system that permitted these atrocities is still very much in place.

Nice(er) facility or not, a jail (cage, tent or building) is still a jail & the horrors of detention are meant to be a deterrent to migration.

And because places like Carrizo are temporary in nature, children are often held in conditions that aren’t equivalent to other ORR detention centers, which already have a history of well-reported abuses, including sexual harassment and a lack of proper background checks.

FACT: Children are meant to be held in emergency reception centers for short periods of time.

CAVEAT: From our experience working at these places, we know kids are sometimes held for longer periods of time & often have to start their immigration cases while detained.

To make things clear:

Most unaccompanied children in detention have relatives in the U.S. to which they can be released to while their immigration case plays out.

These detention facilities are not their safeguard from the world.

What most folks don't know and the thing that’s particularly bad about the HHS/ORR system is that, although children are kept in so-called “protective environments” while at places like Carrizo, they are - in fact - being processed for deportation by @DHSgov & @TheJusticeDept.

They, not @HHSGov, are the ones truly in charge of what happens to these kids & they do everything possible to deport them before they can reunite w/family in the U.S.

It's easy to see metal cages; but these kids will be locked in paper cages long after they leave Carrizo.

The biggest threat to any of these children’s safety is that they be deported by the U.S. government back to the most dangerous places for children in our hemisphere.

KEY FACT: The DHS/DOJ don't have to put them in deportation proceedings. They are choosing to do so.

That's why we demand:
1⃣The gov't immediately reunite children w/their families
2⃣The gov't ensure that children with no safe or appropriate caregiver in the U.S. are taken out of removal proceedings & given access to refugee services
3⃣All children receive access to an attorney

We need a system that seeks real well-being for immigrants.

@POTUS has the authority to #EndDetention TODAY.

Children & families that have been uprooted from their homes do not have to suffer in these facilities. They should instead be uplifted & welcomed with open arms.