Fault Lines investigates the business of immigrant detention in the US
"Punishment and Profits: Immigration Detention", 2012
Immigration is a key issue in the U.S. presidential election with Republican candidates trying to demonstrate their tough stance on undocumented immigrants. Meanwhile, under the Obama administration, the detention and deportation of immigrants has reached an all-time high. Each day, the U.S. government detains more than 33,000 non-citizens at a cost of $5.5 million per day. The result is a lot of money for the powerful private prison industry, which spends millions of dollars on lobbying and now operates nearly half of the country's immigration detention centers. Fault Lines travels to Texas and Florida to investigate the business of immigrant detention and to find out how a handful of companies help to shape U.S. immigration laws.
To them he is profit. That's why he's been detained. That's why he's not home with me.
Hope Mustakim, wife of Nazry Mustakim who was detained by ICE for nearly a year in the South Texas Detention Complex in Pearsall, Texas
Referenced in The Political Economy of the Spectacle and Postmodern Caste by Dr. John Asimakopoulos
Referenced in The Figure of the Migrant by Thomas Nail
Referenced in Insurgent Aesthetics: Security and the Queer Life of the Forever War by Ronak K. Kapadia
Watch Judy Greene on The Sunday Show with Philip Maldari
Referenced in The “Securitization of Migration” in the U.S. and Europe by Anne Lundbye
Read Grand Rapids Institute for Information Democracy's "Punishment and Profits: Immigration Detention"
Truthout resource
International Drug Policy Consortium resource
Prison Industry Divestment Movement resource