Migrant Children and Families Held at Hotels, Investigative Reporting at the NYT Reveals

According to an article appearing in today’s New York Times, the Trump administration has relied on hotels to detain children and families at the border. These hotel detentions are “overseen by a private security company” and, according to the NYT reporting, “have ballooned in recent months.” Children as young as one, including those arriving without a parent, are being held in these hotels operated by Hampton Inn & Suites, Best Western Plus, Comfort Suites, and other hotel chains.

Reliance on hotels raises a range of concerns, including the fact that these “hotels exist outside the formal detention system” and “are not subject to policies designed to prevent abuse in federal custody or those requiring that detainees be provided access to phones, healthy food, and medical and mental health care.”

This is not the first time that guarded hotels have been used as immigration prisons. For example, under the Reagan administration, the Americana Motel in Los Angeles was used to hold families in a shadow detention system. It was shut down after the Los Angeles City Attorney filed a misdemeanor complaint against Behavioral Southwest Systems, alleging that the company’s operation of the motel as a detention center violated zoning restrictions and other applicable rules.

More on the history of incarcerating refugee children is included in Professor Philip Schrag’s new book, Baby Jails: The Fight to End the Incarceration of Refugee Children in America.

IE