New NIJC Report Calls On U.S. Government To Implement Community-Based Programming, Abandon Harmful And Costly Immigration Detention

As the Trump administration seeks to indefinitely detain asylum seekers and continues its rapid expansion of its immigration prison system, a new report from the National Immigrant Justice Center (NIJC) calls on the U.S. government to end the use of immigration detention and adopt community-based models already in use in some U.S. cities and around the world. These programs ensure migrants have access to the support and services they need and can help the United States avoid the costly and inhumane consequences of incarceration.

The report, A Better Way: Community-Based Programming as an Alternative to Immigrant Incarceration, reviews studies of alternatives-to-detention programming and features programs in Chicago, Sweden, and Toronto, Canada, which provide feasible new models for migration processing in the United States. Studies have found that migrants who participate in community-based programming comply with their immigration court cases at rates of 90 percent or higher, and that these programs cost up to 80 percent less than detention.

“Something has gone terribly wrong in our country in the past 30 years where incarceration has become the centerpiece of our immigration system. There are models from around the world and right here in the U.S. that show there is a better way,” said NIJC Director of Policy Heidi Altman. “Why is the United States growing an immigration prison system that harms immigrants and betrays basic human rights norms, when organizations and communities around the world are modeling alternatives that work, are vastly cheaper, and embrace compassion rather than cruelty? It’s an affront to Americans that Congress has failed to seriously consider these proven models, even as they vote to fill the coffers of the private prison industry.”