Frederica Wilson tours 2nd ICE jail with Congresswoman Cherfilus-McCormick

Frederica Wilson tours 2nd ICE jail with Congresswoman Cherfilus-McCormick
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The day after Congresswoman Frederica Wilson visited the ICE Krome Detention Center in Miami-Dade to investigate claims of overcrowded, unsanitary, dangerous and inhuman conditions, a female Haitian detainee died at the Broward Transitional Center, another ICE facility 58 miles to the northeast.

On Friday, Wilson will be joined by Congresswoman Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick to visit the ICE facility where Marie Ange Blaise died last week. They will go in at 9 a.m. and tour the facility for 90 minutes, according to a press statement from Wilson’s office. There will be another press gaggle right outside afterwards at 10:30 a.m.

Read related: Frederica Wilson: ICE is building a tent city at Krome to house more detainees

Earlier in April, Wilson visited Krome but said she didn’t find the overcrowded conditions that had been reported and seen in videos taken by detainees and shared in social media. She suggested the federal government bussed detainees out for a “field trip” and cleaned up to cover up the real conditions detainees are living with.

How does she know they won’t do the same thing in Broward?

Blaise, 44, was arrested Feb. 12 as she tried to board a flight to North Carolina from the international airport in Saint Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands, according to a public statement by ICE. She did not have a valid immigrant visa, ICE said, and was issued a Notice of Expedited Removal immediately. She was first taken to a custodial facility in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and sent the following week to the Richwood Correctional Center in Louisiana. On April 5, ICE transferred her to the Pompano Beach Detention Center at 3900 Powerline Rd.

She wasn’t even there three weeks when ICE reported she had died.

Her death is under investigation.

Cherfilus-McCormick suggested on Wednesday on the House floor that Blaise did not get needed medical care while in ICE custody.

“Marie had been complaining about chest pain for hours,” Cherfilus-McCormick, the only Haitian-American Congress member, said. “They gave her some pills and told her to go lie down. Unfortunately, Marie never woke up.

“Her loved ones deserve answers. They deserve accountability,” she said.

ICE denied keeping Blaise from medical care and said all detainees get the proper treatment.

“ICE remains committed to ensuring that all those in its custody reside in safe, secure, and humane environments,” the agency said in a statement. “Comprehensive medical care is provided from the moment individuals arrive and throughout the entirety of their stay. All people in ICE custody receive medical, dental and mental health screening and 24-hour emergency care at each detention facility. At no time during detention is a detained illegal alien denied emergent care.”

But that is during normal operations. These facilities are reportedly stretched beyond capacity. At Krome, Wilson reported seeing a plexiglass or plastic tent had just been built to house up to 400 immigrants. Guards are likely overwhelmed and raw. The detainees are scared out of their minds. It is a recipe for disaster.

It certainly hasn’t been smooth going. At least six people have died in ICE custody so far this year, according to the agency’s own reporting.

Read related: Campaign ramps up vs Miami’s Cuban, Republican congressional delegation

“This Administration’s deportation process has been sloppy and reckless since Day 1. No due process and no transparency,” Cherfilus-McCormick said to her colleagues. “Just families being illegally ripped apart and left to fend for themselves.

“In severe instances, innocent people have actually died,” she said.

“Immigrants are being treated without basic dignity and being denied medical care,” Cherfilus-McCormick said. “It is this neglect and cruelty that is really hurting our American families who are being deported at this moment. We must have transparency. We must have justice.”

It seems like White House and ICE care about as much about a death on their watch as the Cuban-American Republican congress members who haven’t done much if anything to object to what’s been happening. Five days after Blaise died, ICE giddily announced it had arrested 66,463 people without legal immigration Status, deporting 65,682 in the first 100 days of Trump’s second presidency? Has anybody bothered to find out what happened to the other 981?

And it doesn’t look like the Trump administration is going to back off its aggressive tactics — recruiting local police and the United States Postal Service, raiding schools, snatching college students off the street or the spouses of U.S. citizens at immigration meetings — anytime soon. ICE just said that last week’s Operation Tidal Wave in Florida netted more than 1,100 detainees and Gov. Ron DeSantis said Thursday he wants the National Guard to act as immigration judges to deport people faster.

“What we’re doing is a change in the culture this first hundred days, and we are seeing success,” Homeland Security Spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin told National Public Radio, which is doing a great job while it still exists.

“But we’re going to see those numbers increase in the next hundred days.”

What? The number of detainees that die in custody?

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