House would block Feds from interfering with state pot laws

WASHINGTON — The Democratic-controlled House voted 267 to 165 to block the Justice Department from interfering with states that have legalized recreational marijuana.

The bipartisan vote was a breakthrough for advocates of legalization, who had unsuccessfully pressed the idea in the past under GOP control of the House. Eleven states have legalized marijuana for personal use, but possessing and selling it remains a federal offense.

Lawmakers had already enacted protection for the 47 states where medical marijuana is legal.

Attorney General William Barr said at his confirmation hearing in January that Justice would not go after marijuana companies in states where cannabis is legal. He vowed not to use limited government resources to target cannabis businesses that comply with state laws. Many had relied on guidance from the Obama administration that kept federal authorities from cracking down. But those guidelines were rescinded by the former attorney general, Jeff Sessions.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2019/06/20/house-would-block-feds-from-interfering-with-state-pot-laws/wrI3shf2WzDD3aP5t4IwCJ/story.html?et_rid=827336609&s_campaign=todayinpolitics:newsletter

Thousands of kids have been sexually abused at U.S. migrant shelters, feds say
BY MONIQUE O. MADAN

Thousands of migrant children have been sexually abused while being detained at U.S. government-run shelters, according to Department of Health and Human Services documents.

The data — which was released Tuesday by Florida Democratic Rep. Ted Deutch during a Judicial Committee hearing on the Trump administration’s child separation policy — shows that more than 1,000 allegations of sexual abuse of unaccompanied minors were reported to the Office of Refugee Resettlement every fiscal year since 2015.

The allegations include rape, sexual assault and harassment, according to the data. The news was first reported by CBS News.

In total, the documents show that 4,556 sexual abuse complaints were reported to the resettlement agency between October 2014 and July 2018; 1,303 complaints were also filed with the Department of Justice between fiscal years 2015 and 2018.
https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/immigration/article227009559.html

U.S. Spends $500,000 a Day on Homestead Child-Migrant Camp
JERRY IANNELLI

The Trump Administration did not need to rip children from their families at the U.S. border. The White House simply chose to do that to intentionally broadcast our nation's cruelty and barbarity to the world. Trump's cabinet also does not need to house unaccompanied kids in tent cities, including the child-migrant camp currently operating in Homestead, Florida. Many immigrant-rights groups say it's easier and more humane to let migrant kids live with U.S. relatives or foster groups.

Now, the news site Quartz has dug up publicly available budget documents showing just how much money Americans are spending to keep the shelter open: about $17 million every month. According to federal budget documents, the United States has spent $140 million since February to operate the shelter.

Immigration officials are also illegally sending migrant kids directly from the Homestead compound to adult detention facilities once they turn 18. New Times reported in August that at least 14 children have been sent directly from Homestead to the Broward Transitional Center, an adult Immigration and Customs Enforcement prison, on their 18th birthdays. Immigration attorneys told New Times that three legal precedents should protect migrant children from being handed over to ICE when they turn 18, but that federal officials regularly flout those rules.

In the meantime, the facility has attracted gigantic masses of protesters, repeatedly demanding it be closed. They want the children released to their families, willing foster families, or facilities where they are at least not surrounded by locked fences 24/7.

There are signs the federal government may blow even more money on needlessly imprisoning child immigrants. President Trump yesterday stood at a podium and ranted about how he basically wants to create more concentration camps tent cities to house migrants, and that the immigrants will either be deported or never, ever allowed to leave. In addition to being morally heinous, it turns out that running never-ending kid prisons is costly, too.

By the time they arrived in Homestead, the migrant children had already taken an unwitting tour through American detention facilities with nicknames such as "la hielera" — "the ice box" — and "la perrera" — "the dog kennel." Some had been separated from their parents at the southern border, usually after begging for a goodbye that guards refused to allow. Several of the teenage girls, despondent after being ripped from their families, were asked to feed, change, and care for the now-parentless babies.

Since the Trump administration quietly reopened the Miami-area shelter almost a year and a half ago, the thousands of kids inside have been seen only in the shadows. Driven behind the gates in buses, they've disappeared into the tents and trailers that make up the facility, which is run by a private [FOR PROFIT] company, out of view of Florida child-welfare officials. They've only been seen running around the fields outside, their heads covered by orange caps. Why they came to the United States, what they've experienced in Homestead, and how they feel about it remained unknown — until just recently.

Children at the Homestead Migrant Shelter Share Stories of Grief, Trauma, and Fear
Illustration by Scott Anderson
"I cried every day because I didn’t want to be there."
Alone in a room filled with bunk beds, M.G. could only wonder what he'd done. The youth counselors who stood watch outside his door wouldn't say. They simply stared as he ate his meals in silence. Occasionally, one of them would talk to him. Otherwise, the Mexican teenager sat in total isolation, barred from going to school or recreational activities with the other kids.

"I cried every day because I didn’t want to be there," he said. "I felt so alone that I was even losing my appetite. I didn't leave the bed. I didn’t have anything to do. At one point, they brought me Monopoly, but I couldn’t play alone."

Eight days passed. Finally, a woman told M.G. he could come out if he behaved. But he didn’t know what he’d done wrong. He’d never been reported for misbehavior at the Homestead shelter.

It had been weeks since he arrived, shipped to South Florida after being caught by immigration officials when he crossed into the United States and fell to the ground. A Border Patrol agent had put his foot on M.G. and asked, "Do you want to run?"

He thought being at the Homestead shelter was almost like being in prison. Guards searched the dorm rooms while the kids were gone and took the cookies M.G. had saved from lunch. He spent his 16th birthday crying. Early last July, he asked to go home. That was when he was sent to the roomful of bunks and left there by himself for more than a week. He never found out why — not even when his mom called the detention center to ask.

"I was never told why I was put in there," he said. "When I got out and first felt the sun, it felt amazing."

"They would yell at me telling me to remain quiet."
For two long days, N.J. waited to see her father. She had been flown from the Homestead shelter to Texas July 25 and told that her family was being reunited on the government's orders. Hours passed, and N.J. was taken somewhere to sleep. The next day, she waited until falling asleep again. At 3 in the morning, immigration officials woke her and told her to gather her things. She was going back to Homestead.

"I asked what had happened to my father, and they told me they could not reunite us yet because there had been some complications with my father's flight," she said. "To this day, I still haven’t spoken to anyone to find out what is going to happen to me and when I will be reunited with my father."

The two had come to the States together, accompanied by N.J.’s stepmother and 3-month-old sister. They left Guatemala because they were being extorted by gang members with no recourse: Local police did nothing when her father was stabbed and her family was threatened with kidnapping.

They crossed the border in Texas and asked for asylum. Immigration officials took them to a facility where they were separated. Again and again, N.J. asked the guards where her father was and if the two could be together.

"But they would yell at me telling me to remain quiet and saying that I didn’t belong because the United States government didn’t want Guatemalans, Hondurans, or Salvadorans in the United States," she said.

Eventually, she wound up in Homestead, where she learned her father was in a detention center in Texas. Over the phone, he told her he was seeking asylum for the whole family. After the failed reunion in Texas, though, N.J. wasn't sure what had happened to him. No one seemed to know. She worried his life would be at stake if he was forced to return to Guatemala.

"I hope I can remain in the United States," she said, "and start a new life with my family."

"I did not know when it was day or night."
A devout Christian, D.J. wouldn’t repeat the insults and obscenities the guards spewed at him and the other children at the "concentration camp" in Homestead, FL.

la perrera
He was hungry and cold at the Texas detention facility, where migrants slept on the floor and used flimsy foil blankets for warmth. The lights were on at all hours, and D.J. "did not know when it was day or night." He felt terrible, but if he and the other children tried to talk to one another, the guards became incensed.

"The guards insulted us using the worst and ugliest words imaginable," he said. "They insulted our mothers too."

The 16-year-old had left Honduras and traveled alone to the United States, reaching Texas this past March. Border agents stopped him after he crossed a river. After four days inside la perrera, D.J. landed at the Homestead shelter. A few weeks into his stay, he was finding it difficult to adjust. Back home, he was used to being hugged and told good night by his family.

"I don’t have anyone to do that for me here," he said. "I cry in my room some nights. I try to distract myself by reading the Bible, listening to music, or talking with other kids. But it is most hard and sad to think about my family because I miss them a lot."

He knew that other kids — the ones who had no one in the United States to take them in — had it worse. D.J. had an aunt in Maryland who was trying to set up a fingerprinting appointment so the government could verify the two were related and he could be released to her. Some of the other children weren’t so lucky. They didn’t know whether they’d ever be allowed to leave.

"These children are suffering the most," D.J. said. "They do not have energy, they do not have hope, they do not want to talk with anyone, and they are not motivated to play. One of my friends has no one to receive him in the United States. When he is in his room, he just cries and cries."

Children at the Homestead Migrant Shelter Share Stories of Grief, Trauma, and Fear
After four days in that "awful" place, Z.P. was send to the Homestead shelter. Even after just a week there, she longed to be released to her grandpa, a legal resident who lives in Maryland. No one was hurting her at Homestead, she said, but it wasn't like being with family.

"The first time I talked to my mom, I cried so much that I think I worried her," she said. "So I tried not to cry after that."

"I felt alone in a place with strangers."
There was no milk, so M.R. gave the babies juice. Newly torn from her father, she found herself caring for a 1-year-old and a 2-year-old at a facility somewhere near the southern border. The guards were mean and the shelter was freezing cold, but M.R. was there to change and feed the babies when they woke up screaming.

"It was really bad because the babies would cry at night missing their parents," she said.

At home in Honduras, M.R. was one of 12 siblings. There wasn’t enough food or clothing for everyone. She and her father had hoped the United States would offer the family a better future. They came here together in May of last year and presented themselves to Border Protection officers, who soon separated them. They weren't allowed to say goodbye.

M.R. spent two days in the shelter with the babies before immigration officials told her she was going to "a better place." They put her on a bus and drove her to the airport. They didn’t say where the plane was going.

"I was afraid and sad and crying because I did not know where my dad was," she said. "I felt alone in a place with strangers."

After arriving in Homestead, M.R. still felt overwhelmed by sadness even though she liked her teacher and didn’t feel mistreated. She talked to her mom twice a week but wanted to talk to her dad too. A whole month passed before she found out he’d been deported.

"I would like to talk to my mom in Honduras more often," she said. "I tell her how I am doing here. She gives me advice to be good and do not get in trouble. I think I need more time to talk to her. I do not talk to my father often because now that he is deported to Honduras, he is always working."

"I have been here so long."
He didn’t want his mother to worry, so A.A. never told her about his nose. A boy in his classroom, Bravo 11, had punched him without provocation, making blood gush from his nose. The youth counselors didn’t notice. A.A. asked to go to the medical unit, but no one took him. In his twice-weekly phone calls with his mom, he never mentioned any of it.

"Already it is very hard," the 14-year-old said. "We both cry on the phone."

A.A. had left Honduras with his maternal aunt in late 2018. Border agents separated them, and he spent a day and a half at la hielera before being taken to Homestead December 3. There, he took classes with about 35 other boys, although it was difficult to learn because the lessons started over every time new kids arrived. They studied every day — weekends were supposed to be for movies, religion, and rest, until the director decided it was "better for us to study English."

The rules were strict at Homestead, and A.A. knew it was important to follow them. His social worker had told him that each report of bad behavior would delay his release by 15 days. He'd also heard that a judge would see any reports in his file and hold it against him when making decisions about his case. But it didn’t seem to go that way with the boy who had punched him.

"The one who broke my nose was released after three weeks, while I am still here," A.A. said. "It is not fair, but the social worker tells me every case is different."

By the end of March, he had been at the shelter almost four months. He talked to his social worker on the computer once a week for updates about his case, and he felt frustrated when internet problems cut their conversations short. He was eager to leave Homestead and live with his paternal aunt in Virginia.

"I have not seen my mom or any family for so long," he said. "I have been here so long."

"The first time I talked to my mom, I cried so much."
When a gangbanger began lurking outside her high school each day to tell her he wanted to be her boyfriend, Z.P. knew she had to leave El Salvador. She used to know a girl who dated a boy in a gang. Gang members killed her, cut off her arms and legs, and used her WhatsApp account to send her mother a photo.

"My cousin, who is a gang member and knows the guy who was bothering me, came to warn me," Z.P. said. "He told me he heard them talking about doing terrible things to me and that if I could flee, I should."

She began the trek to the United States in March. On the way up through Mexico, an armed man attacked the car she was riding in. Some of the migrants inside were hurt. Terrified, Z.P. sprinted from the car and into the woods to hide.

"My legs were shaking so hard I could barely run," she said. "I was so scared. In that moment, I regretted trying to flee because I didn’t want to die on the trip. I wanted to stay with my mom, but I also could never make my mom go through me being killed in El Salvador by the gangs, so I had to leave."

She entered the States near McAllen, Texas. Border patrol officers took her to la perrera. There, the bathrooms were so dirty that Z.P. tried not to drink any water. Her head ached, but she didn’t say anything, believing no one would care. The crinkling of the foil blankets put her on edge and added to her unease. "I never want to see aluminum again after using those blankets," she said.

HHS’s Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) has worked aggressively to meet its responsibility, by law, to provide shelter for unaccompanied children referred to its care by the Department of Homeland Security while we work to find a suitable sponsor in the U.S. Since opening in March 2018, over 13,053 UAC have been placed at the site and more than 10,668 have been discharged to a suitable sponsor (usually a parent or close family relative).

U.S. Customs and Border Protection did not respond to a request for comment. New Times also contacted Caliburn International, the for-profit company that operates the Homestead shelter. In February 2018, the firm's subsidiary Comprehensive Health Services Inc. was awarded a $31 million contract to oversee the shelter. In April 2019, Caliburn won a $341 million, no-bid contract to expand the facility. A company spokesperson did not respond to New Times’ request for comment.
https://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/homestead-miami-migrant-camp-for-children-costs-500000-per-day-10877669