Pressure Builds for Biden to End Trans Detention in ICE Facilities

Activists part of the #EndTransDetention campaign are hoping to keep pressure on President Biden and the administration to release all trans people held in immigration detention facilities. The campaign held a series of protests during Pride Month, wrapping in June with a rally in Santa Ana, CA, meant to highlight the success of the movement to stop the incarceration of LGBTQ immigrants and asylum seekers.

A number of former detainees spoke to the injustice they say they experienced in ICE detention centers. A representative from the campaign says these included “lack of training by ICE, subhuman conditions,” and the use of harsh restraints.

Santa Ana became the first-ever sanctuary city to close an ICE facility in December 2016, a landmark moment that helped to build momentum to shut down New Mexico’s Cibola County Correctional Facility in 2020. This was the nation’s first “transgender pod,” which was intended to address the particular needs of trans detainees but was regularly accused of mistreatment, including the lack and denial of basic healthcare needs.

The Guardian reported in 2020 that there are 31 trans people in ICE detention centers around the country, and at least three trans women have died in ICE custody in recent years: Victoria Arellano, Roxsana Hernández, and Johana Medina León. Hernández’s family recently sued the federal government over the circumstances that lead to her death in 2018.

Protestors with #EndTransDetention are now calling on the Biden administration to release all transgender people currently held in ICE custody. The campaign began with a coalition of groups, including Familia: Trans Queer Liberation Movement, Mijente, the Black LGBTQIA+ Migrant Project, and the Transgender Law Center.

The campaign is also demanding the release of a trans woman named Maura who has been detained at the Otay Mesa Detention Center in California for more than two years. A petition started by the Los Angeles group Translatin@ Coalition says Maura is “suffering from abuse and a lack of adequate medical care.”

The petition says, “Maura is seeking humanitarian protection to be able to stay in the U.S. She faces significant risk of forced deportation to a country she has not known for decades, essentially forcing her into permanent exile from her chosen family and home.” The petition supports add that Maura “hopes to one day be free again and engage in activities she loves: dancing, singing along to Celia Cruz’s ‘LA Vida Es Un Carnaval,’ and producing and performing in shows.”

Biden pledged shortly after taking office to help advance LGBTQ rights around the world, though members of the #EndTransDetention campaign say part of this promise is addressing this ongoing detention of trans people by ICE.