Banning Future ICE Contracts In NJ Isn't Enough, Activists Argue

NEWARK, NJ — For some New Jersey activists, banning all future local prison contracts with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) would be a landmark leap forward. But for others, much more drastic action is necessary.

And it’s needed now, not later, they say.

On Thursday, a coalition of groups in North Jersey released a joint statement about two bills that would regulate the presence of ICE detention centers in New Jersey: A-5207 and S-3361.

If passed, the bills would ban state/local entities and private correctional facilities making contracts with federal immigration authorities to detain “noncitizens.” Prisons would also be prohibited from extending old contracts, some of which reportedly net tens of millions of dollars per year.

The bills have picked up eager support from a large contingent of activists and legislators. Read More: New Push For Immigrant Rights Launches In NJ

But other groups argue that the bills don’t go far enough, especially considering the potential dangers of the coronavirus pandemic in prisons.

The following groups signed Thursday’s statement: the Green Party of New Jersey, Young Ecosocialists, Ridgewood for Black Liberation, Party for Socialism and Liberation - New Jersey, Ramsey Alliance for Social Equity, Malaya Movement New Jersey, Sunrise Movement Union County, Anakbayan North Jersey, Sunrise Movement Point Pleasant Beach, #NJAntiWarAgenda, Ridgefield Park 4 Equality, Black Lives Matter Teaneck, Black Lives Matter Hackettstown and Long Valley, Sunrise Movement Bergen County, Sunrise Movement Hunterdon County, Black Lives Matter Bergen County, and the Jobs and Equal Rights Campaign.

It partly reads:

“While prohibiting the signing of new contracts with ICE or the extension of current contracts, it allows for the four detention centers in Northern New Jersey – Hudson County, Essex County, Elizabeth and Bergen County – to remain open for the length of their current contracts. Nothing in this bill speaks of the need or requirement to shut down the existing facilities. In some cases, this would be years and in Hudson County, based on the commissioners’ November 2020 vote, 10 years. These bills also depend on promises made by New Jersey politicians in regard to the closing of current facilities, along with a promise of not allowing any new facilities to be opened by future law changes. Promises such as these have been made and broken on a regular basis. One needs to look no further than the promise made by the Hudson County freeholders in November 2018 that they would take two years to find alternative sources of income for the county and close the facility in 2020. Despite hours of testimony by over 100 witnesses calling for the shutdown of the detention center at a commissioners’ meeting just before Thanksgiving 2020, the commissioners voted to extend the contract by 10 years.”

The activists continued:

“While we may appreciate the fact that the bill states there will be no additional ICE facilities in this state should it pass (if promises are not broken by future elected officials), it is totally unacceptable for the current ICE facilities to remain open until their current contracts expire and totally inconsistent with the message we’ve promoted so strongly for years -- with increased intensity since early 2020 and the beginning of the pandemic … We have called for ICE to be abolished and for all those held inside the detention centers to be released immediately because especially during this time of COVID-19, time spent in these detention centers for immigration matters should not be elevated to a potential death sentence.”

There are also other factors to consider, activists said:

“Additionally, this bill fails to address other ways ICE contracts private and public bodies in New Jersey to continue to terrorize members of our communities in other ways besides detention. For example, there is nothing in regard to contracts like those historically held with Middletown and Vineland to use municipal facilities. In Vineland, a town where many migrant workers have settled, this means the Philadelphia Branch of ICE has been able to, for the last few years, travel to Vineland to use the police department’s shooting range, and thereafter target migrants nearby.”

“Tell those held captive by the state and those who had been on hunger strike that the detention center they are in may remain open for another five to 10 years,” the groups said.

“The people running these facilities must be held accountable,” they concluded. “Until then, our fight continues.”

• See related article: Prison Hunger Strikes Continue In NJ As ICE Detainees Fear COVID
• See related article: Rally At Newark Penn Station: 'Free Immigrant Detainees'

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