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Resilience OC

Community Responds to ICE and GEO’s Plan to Expand Private Immigrant Prisons in California

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: May 21, 2018

Community Responds to ICE and GEO’s Plan to Expand Private Immigrant Prisons in California

Immigrant rights advocates denounce GEO and ICE’s back deal negotiations to massively expand private immigrant prisons in the state of California.

Immigration advocates, led by directly impacted and previously incarcerated community members of California, condemn and oppose any expansion of new and private immigration for-profit detention facilities in the state. Local and state groups call on California legislators to act now and protect California values.

Over the last few months the extent of collusion and conspiring between ICE and private prison corporations has grown more apparent, and has been confirmed by ICE’s attempt to search for immigrant detention space. Because of victories like the Dignity not Detention Act, ICE is no longer able to establish these contracts in secret as they’ve done in the past, and instead must start these illicit contracts via a public contracting process. Even so, ICE is an untrustworthy actor who will take every opportunity to broker its deals in the shadows.

The collusion that has taken place between those in the business of locking up immigrants and profiting off of their detention and misery must be exposed and confronted. California will not be home to the dehumanizing detention apparatus built by ICE, and our cities and local governments are not pawns to be used by the Florida based GEO Inc, in their plot to profit from incarceration in our state.

We will not be silent as GEO dispatches its CEO George Zoley to essentially bribe local city officials in a plot to expand the Adelanto and Mesa Verde detention facilities. This corporation, which reported revenues of 2.3 billion dollars in 2018, has been sued for participating in human trafficking and using what amounts to slave labor in their for-profit facilities. In addition, countless individuals have died under the custody of GEO and ICE. We will not turn a blind eye to this injustice nor will we shy away from confronting the cruel, degrading and sometimes deadly treatment of our community members.

Immigrant rights groups, as well as formerly and currently incarcerated community members are ready to fight back against policies of violence and private businesses who seek to target our community and undo and circumvent the legislative victories our community and advocates have accomplished. The plans laid out by ICE, and the deceptive tactics used by GEO to pursue detention expansion threaten the core of our state’s values.

Organizers across the state will rally to defend immigrant communities from threats of mass incarceration and deportation. We will defend the spirit and values that we hold dear as a state, including defending the Dignity Not Detention Act that ICE and GEO have attempted to undermine. Cities and Counties can move on this front too by limiting and zoning out any possibility for private prison expansion.

Signatories

Resilience Orange County

Immigrant Legal Resource Center

California Immigrant Youth Justice Alliance

Pangea Legal Services

California Collaborative for Immigrant Justice

SIREN (Services, Immigrant Rights and Education Network)

Freedom for Immigrants

Filipino Advocates for Justice

Ground Game LA

East Bay Alliance for a Sustainable Economy

California Sanctuary Campaign

Alianza Sacramento

United Now For Immigrants Rights

Mesa Verde Liberation Front

Community Action Board of Santa Cruz County, Inc (CAB)

CAIR San Francisco Bay Area

We Rise SF / Labor Center for Immigrant Justice

Immigration Task Force of Monterey County

Rapid Response Network of Monterey County

Contra Costa Immigrant Rights Alliance

Legal Services for Children

UNITE HERE! Local 483

STEP UP! Sacramento

Centro Legal de la Raza

Brave New Films

Wellstone Democratic Renewal Club

Monterey Bay Central Labor Council

Resilience OC
Resilience OC
Resilience Orange County is an organization that was created in 2016 out of the merging of two established organizations RAIZ (Resistencia Autonomia Igualdad y lideraZgo) and Santa Ana Boys and Men of Color.

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