Members have found out about ICE immigration actions in their districts after the fact. The least we can do as Members of Congress is to provide oversight and keep track of how much DHS is...

Floor Speech

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Mr. Chairman, the United States already operates the largest immigration detention system in the world at a cost of $2 billion annually. In fiscal year 2017, ICE had the capacity to detain an unprecedented 39,324 men, women, and children. Although a large amount of funding is dedicated to detain these people, the system is
plagued with inhumane conditions and inadequate oversight. Mr. Chairman, my amendment imposes a moratorium on the construction and expansion of immigration detention facilities.

This year, we are seeing the highest number of deaths in ICE custody since 2011. Private, for-profit detention facilities in particular have not abided by basic standards necessary to protect civil and constitutional rights, and all of this is occurring at the same time that the administration is increasing enforcement, including expedited removals with inadequate due process, elimination of the longstanding division between local police and Federal immigration enforcement, and this is all tearing families apart.

The overreach of these detention facilities combined with an overreach on enforcement in general, instead of focussing on more practical, humane, and, frankly, economically viable options of alternatives to detention, are issues that Congress must address.

We should not be funding these dangerous overreaches by expanding immigration detention with no accountability. This amendment ensures that we focus on fixing this broken system as opposed to funding an
increased detention expansion, and this is deadly. It is a deadly powder keg, and I don't use the term ``deadly'' lightly.

I would like to take a moment to talk about Jacinta Morales, a woman from Oregon detained at the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma, Washington. Jacinta found out she was pregnant while she was in detention. She said: I was thrilled to be pregnant and thrilled at the prospect of being a mother again.

When she found out she would be deported, torn from her 11-year-old U.S. citizen son as well as her long-time partner, Jacinta was devastated. She experienced pain and nausea, and not long after, she woke up bleeding. After an hour, she went to the doctor, where she waited another hour. One of the people who was seen before her had a toothache.

When the doctor finally saw her, they requested an ambulance to take her to the hospital, but the ambulance didn't come for a long time, and so they took her in the back of a patrol car where she was forced to sit up, making the bleeding worse. When Jacinta finally arrived at the hospital, she learned she had a miscarriage.

Jacinta is one of 292 pregnant women ICE detained between January and April of 2017, alone, and part of the 60 percent of detained women. Formerly detained women and their attorneys and advocates have reported
that pregnant women only receive the bare minimum of services and accommodations and are routinely denied extra blankets, additional food, and adequate prenatal care.

When pregnant women are referred to outside obstetricians, ICE policy does not prohibit the shackling of pregnant women during transport. Moreover, the stress of detention and fear of miscarriage may lead detained women to abandon their asylum claims.

One of these women, I am going to call her Ana, accepted deportation back into the hands of her abuser because she was so afraid that being detained would harm her unborn child.

ICE's own detention standards and directive on the detention of pregnant women acknowledges the complexity and risks of detaining pregnant women, but implementation and oversight are not enough to protect these women.

It is irresponsible to expand detention while the agency struggles to conduct even basic oversight and hold facilities accountable for inhumane conditions. I urge my colleagues to support my amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. Chairman, I will just say that we currently have almost 40,000 people in detention. We are not proposing eliminating all detention centers. We are saying we are putting a moratorium on expansion of detention centers. Those people would still be able to stay there. We could detain up to that many people.

I don't think that is the right policy for the United States of America, but I am not saying that we are going to eliminate all of that detention space. What I am saying is that we need accountability around the detention system, and as long as we don't have that accountability and we have pregnant women who are losing children in the ICE detention facilities, I believe that we should ensure that we have accountability.

I will tell you that we are continuing to detain and not hold these detention centers accountable for any of the things that happen within the detention centers, so, again, I hope that my colleagues will support this amendment and allow us to bring some accountability back to our detention system.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

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