Thread by @arapaho415

(1/16) #ZeroTolerance
Detention centers for adult asylum seekers and subsequent "tender care"/foster care facilities are administered at the state, not federal level. This <thread> provides a background on the process involved in awarding these contracts.

(2/16) It looks like GOP is taking steps to staunch the unrelenting flow of orphaned asylum seeking children to state-licensed "tender age"/foster care facilities:

External Tweet loading...
If nothing shows, it may have been deleted
by @tarapalmeri view original on Twitter

(3/16) On Jun 21, @nytimes published this map of the states which have licensed "tender age"/foster care facilities for detained youth asylum seekers. It's vital that these minors are reunited with their parent, but that's a subject for another <thread>.

External Tweet loading...
If nothing shows, it may have been deleted
by @nytpolitics view original on Twitter

(4/16) Because detention centers are administered at the state-level, local reporting may offer the most thorough assessment of the status of detainees within each of the 17 states which provide detention centers.

(5/16) However, in Oct 2017, @seramak published an in-depth (and lengthy) analysis of a federal prison run by CoreCivic in Cibola County NM that was ordered shut by the federal gov't in Sep 2016, and re-opened as a detention center in Oct 2016.
nmindepth.com/2017/10/26/ins…

(6/16) Background: "New Mexico is more reliant on private prisons than any other state. In 2015, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, 42 percent of its state prisoners were held in private prisons. The national figure is 8 percent."

(7/16) On Jul29 2016, the federal gov't notified CorrectionsCorporationOfAmerica a long-troubled fed. prison the company had operated for 16 yrs will be closed down.
Photo:Storm over I-40 in NM near CibolaCountyCorrectionalFacility (Reuters|LucasJackson)
thenation.com/article/feds-w…

(8/16) Back to @SeraMak Oct 2017 article:
"In October 2016, CoreCivic landed one ICE deal in New Mexico by repurposing a federal prison, the 1,129-bed Cibola County Correctional Center, into an ICE detention center."

(9/16) "For CoreCivic, a single facility in the immigrant detention system represents big business. To date, the company has nine dedicated ICE centers and at least three other prisons under contract with U.S. Marshals Service where ICE detainees are held."

(10/16) "CoreCivic will be paid $150 million for detaining immigrants at Cibola over the course of a five-year arrangement with county officials and ICE that amounts to a no-bid contract with the federal government.... (con't)

(11/16) Agreements between government entities – whether county, state or federal – do not entail the competitive open bid process required of private companies seeking government business. (con't)

(12/16) In this instance, however, Cibola County serves only as a pass-through payment mechanism for federal funds to flow from ICE to CoreCivic."

(13/16) "In March [2017], ICE began sending millions of dollars to Cibola County, which in turn forwards the money to CoreCivic, as spelled out in an 'intergovernmental agreement' between ICE and the county and a subcontract between the county and CoreCivic."

(14/16) A"ccording to the subcontract and county treasurer, the county keeps 50 cents per detainee per day, while CoreCivic, a $3.7 billion company, receives a lump sum fixed payment of $2.5 million monthly, whether zero or 847 detainees are being held."

(15/16) If detainee count reaches "848, ICE pays $55.43 per additional detainee per day."
Between March, April and May 2017, daily counts of detainees ranged between 268 and 784.

(16/16) "The setup reflects national trends... the pairing of an agreement between government entities alongside a subcontract with a private corporation is 'the single most common model in the entire immigration detention system.'”
[END OF <THREAD>]