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Florida Child Migrant Detention Facility Shuts Down

Associated Press

   MIAMI - The Trump administration announced Monday that it is shutting
   down one of the largest U.S. facilities for child migrants, which had
   come under intense criticism because of its regimented conditions and
   the contractor's ties to a freshly departed White House official.

   The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said in a statement
   that it has reduced bed capacity from 1,200 to zero and the contract
   with Comprehensive Health Services Inc. is set to end on Nov. 30. About
   2,000 workers will be let go in the coming days.

   The Homestead, Florida, facility emptied out in August but had remained
   operational in case there was no room at shelters for teen migrants who
   cross the U.S.-Mexico border and end up in government custody.

   Health and Human Services said the decision to eliminate beds was to
   "ensure fiscal prudence."Last month, Jonathan Hayes, director of the
   department's Office of Refugee Resettlement, said the facility was
   costing $720,000 a day to run even when no children were left there.

   In a letter to Congress, the administration informed lawmakers that the
   facility was transitioning to "warm status" with no beds but would
   retain access to the site in case the number of child migrants rises.

   A court filing earlier this year alleged the government was holding
   migrant children in "prison-like conditions" for months, allowing
   limited phone calls and ordering them to follow strict rules or face
   prolonged detention.

   Democratic presidential hopefuls turned the Miami-area facility into a
   campaign stop this summer, when about 2,500 teens were held there. They
   attacked the administration for holding children in a cramped detention
   center run by a private company tied to former White House Chief of
   Staff John Kelly.

   The Homestead facility, a former Labor Department Job Corps site, also
   was used during the Obama administration to hold up to 800 migrants
   from June 2016 to April 2017.

   It reopened in March 2018, but the contractor was then backed by a
   private equity company Kelly had advised as a board member in the
   months before joining the Trump administration. The facility held as
   many as 140 children who were separated from their parents last year as
   part of a "zero-tolerance" policy that separated thousands of families
   at the U.S.-Mexico border.

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