The Daily - Inside the Migrant Detention Center in Clint, Tex.

Episode Date: July 1, 2019

Federal courts have ruled that migrant children inside the United States must be housed in “safe and sanitary” accommodation. So what explains the conditions at a Border Patrol station in Clint, Tex.? Guest: Caitlin Dickerson, who covers immigration for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Background reading: Soiled clothes, no diapers and no access to showers or soap — read more about the conditions that migrant children faced in an overcrowded border station in Texas.The authorities emptied the station, then moved more than 100 children back in. A Times reporter toured the site last week.Congress sent President Trump a $4.6 billion border aid package that left Democratic lawmakers badly divided.

From The New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. Today. Federal courts have ruled that once inside the U.S., migrant children must be housed in safe and sanitary conditions. So what explains the conditions at a Border Patrol station in Clint, Texas? It's Monday, July 1st. Caitlin, tell us how you first heard about this detention center in Clint, Texas.

you first heard about this detention center in Clint, Texas? So a couple of weeks ago, I got a call from a source, an immigration lawyer who I work with, who told me that she and a group of her colleagues were going to a facility in Texas where hundreds of immigrant children were being housed, and she was going to interview the kids about the conditions there. So immediately my ears perk up because these facilities, almost no one can get in. Journalists are often turned away. Lawmakers are turned away. It's really hard to get access and figure out what it actually looks like on the inside. So of course I say, okay, well, let's keep talking. And can you let me know what you find when you get there? But she said, no. She said, the interviews I'm about to do are confidential. I'm not going

to be able to share with you what I see. Kaitlin Dickerson covers immigration for The Times. Fast forward a few days, and she and the lawyers that she traveled to Texas with were so horrified by what they found in Texas that they changed their minds. They decided to violate intentionally an agreement to keep the interviews they'd done confidential. They didn't disclose the personal details of anybody they talked to, but they summarized for us what the children said. And what exactly did this lawyer see that made her feel compelled to violate this agreement and talk to you? So just to give you a little background, this is somebody who's been working in immigration detention for 12 years. She regularly represents victims of torture and

abuse, people who are seeking asylum. She's seen a lot, is what I'm saying. And she said this was the worst detention facility she'd ever seen in her career. She said there was a stench. Everybody being housed there was a minor. The kids that she interviewed, 60 in total among the group, they were still wearing the same clothes they had on when they'd crossed the border. And some of them had crossed the border weeks earlier. So she actually saw kids who had shirts that were stained with mucus and with vomit and teenage mothers who had breast milk crusted onto their shirts. teenage mothers who had breast milk crusted onto their shirts. She saw toddlers who hadn't been potty trained, but they weren't put in diapers, so they were going to the bathroom in their pants. The children said they had no access to soap, even to wash their hands after they used the bathrooms. They were also hungry. Every single child they interviewed said they weren't getting enough to eat. So regardless of their age, and the youngest child they talked to was five months old. The oldest was 17. They were all getting the same three small meals a day. And so a lot of kids said they were waking up in the middle of the night with hunger

pains. They were sleeping on concrete floors at night and the lights were being left on 24-7. So they were sleep deprived too. The other thing they saw was children as young as eight years old taking care of infants they didn't know. So there are a lot of kids, a lot of babies in this facility. Some of them are there with their teenage mothers, but others were separated from adults who they crossed the border with and delivered to this facility by themselves. and delivered to this facility by themselves. So one of the children they talked to described a situation where a guard came into a room with a two-year-old baby and said, who wants to take care of this baby? How did these kids end up in this facility? Why are they there? Okay, so ever since last fall, the administration has been dealing with record-breaking numbers of children and families crossing the border. And at the same time, they've also instituted policies that have made it more difficult for these children who cross the border and are then detained to be released from detention.

So as a result of those two things, we've seen backups across the entire system of immigration detention, from temporary border patrol facilities where people come as soon as they cross the border to long-term facilities as well. And so in order to just deal with this overcrowding that was happening across their system, they dedicated the one facility in Clint to kids. I'm familiar with the surge of families crossing the border, but what explains this slower process of releasing children from these facilities, which you said contributes to this? So when children cross the border into the United States, people under 18, the federal government has a legal obligation to release them ultimately

to people it approves as sponsors and allow the children to live with those sponsors while their immigration cases are heard, while we decide whether they can stay in the United States or not. Under President Trump, the administration has added additional requirements and placed those requirements on sponsors. Things like fingerprints, not just for the sponsor, but every single person who's living in the sponsor's home, additional background checks, in some cases, DNA tests, all these extra rules. They added these requirements actually as an enforcement technique because a lot of people who apply to sponsor new immigrants are undocumented themselves. And if they're not undocumented,

they often live in homes with other undocumented people. These requirements were added as a way to try to catch those undocumented people and put them into deportation proceedings to ultimately kick them out of the United States. So when you add those requirements, people stop applying to sponsor children who are in custody. And when people stop applying, children get stuck there. They end up languishing. So the system is being squeezed at both ends. There is this surge of minors coming across the border, which it sounds like the administration doesn't really have any control over. And then there's a policy shift that it does have control over in which they're making it harder to release the minors in these facilities to guardians who would take them out of them. Exactly. So given that, how likely is it that these conditions exist in other detention facilities? So even though this lawyer told me Clint was the worst facility she'd ever seen, she also said that she and her colleagues visited other facilities earlier in the month and they documented a lot of the same conditions.

And we've also seen these conditions documented in reports by the Department of Homeland Security's inspector general. One report issued last month talked about facilities where there was standing room only, and the rooms were so crowded with toilets exposed in the rooms, so they don't have separate bathrooms. People were standing up on top of the toilets to get their heads above the crowd so that they could get some air and breathe. Kaitlin, aren't there basic standards that a facility like this one has to follow?

There are rules that govern the detention of immigrant minors in federal custody. They come from a lawsuit that was filed back in the late 1980s, the Flores lawsuit. Lawyers filed a lawsuit on behalf of immigrants who were in detention. And this was before the days of formal immigration detention centers. So they were actually being housed in an old hotel, a two-story hotel in Pasadena that had been built in the 1950s. Immigration agents had drained the pool. And they were putting men, women, and children who were unrelated to each other, regardless of their gender, in random pairings in rooms. The children weren't getting any schooling. A lawyer who was involved in the case described it like the Wild West, very makeshift, and in some

ways similar to Clint in that way. So lawyers got wind of what was happening in this facility. They filed a lawsuit over the detention of minors. It went all the way up to the Supreme Court. It was settled years later in the 1990s. And that settlement, which has been relitigated a few times, really sets the standard for the way that children can be detained in federal immigration custody. And what are those conditions? that children can be detained in federal immigration custody. And what are those conditions? So in general, the judge in the case ordered that facilities where children are housed have to be safe and sanitary, and that federal officials have to make attempts to release

the kids from custody as promptly as possible. So she decided that kids can only stay in Border Patrol facilities, like the one in Clint, for 72 hours. After that, they have to be transferred into longer-term facilities run by the Department of Health and Human Services, which have a lot more rules attached to them. And then that agency has to try to get them out, get them with family or friends so that they're not detained. I can't imagine that the conditions inside this Clint facility described to you by this lawyer meet the criteria of safe and sanitary. So what happens next?

So the lawyers who visited Clint talk not just to me, but other journalists. We write up our stories and they immediately go viral. Doctors and attorneys say hundreds of young people are living under inhumane conditions at a Texas border control station. People react very strongly to the conditions they're hearing about. They found about 250 babies, children, and teenagers without adequate food, water, and sanitation.

Some are so moved, they start to donate money, thousands of dollars, to organizations that advocate for immigrants along the border. And other people get in their cars from New York and California, Washington State,

and they start driving to Clint with diapers and food in the backs of their cars cars from New York and California, Washington state, and they start driving to Clint with diapers and food in the backs of their cars to try to deliver supplies to these children. And right around the same time, that same week. Welcome to the Ninth Circuit. We only have one case on the calendar this afternoon, Flores versus Barr. Lawyers associated with this lawsuit, the Flores lawsuit, had been in federal court. And I guess it's the government going first.

Good afternoon. Sarah Fabian with the Office of Immigration Litigation from the Department of Justice. And they're arguing with the government over some of these very same issues, conditions in facilities where children are being held. are being held. First, with regard to the district court's finding that U.S. Customs and Border Protection was in violation of the Flores Settlement Agreement. They don't think the government is holding up those rules for safe and sanitary conditions? Well, I mean, I think what I would go to is that when you start enumerating, for example, specific hygiene items, and the way that was done is that the court sort of enumerated these and say these fall under the rubric, these fall in the category of what could be required. Again, it wasn't perfume soap, it was soap. It wasn't, you know, high-class milled soap,

it was soap. And that sounds like that's part of safe and sanitary. Are you disagreeing with that? The latest battle was over whether the government should have to provide soap, toothbrushes, or toothpaste to children. And a lawyer representing the Trump administration argued in court that they should not have to provide those things. And what was the rationale for arguing that the government does not need to provide something as basic as soap, toothbrush, and toothpaste to children in these facilities? Well, I think in CBP custody, it's frequently intended to be much shorter term. So it may be that for a shorter term stay in CBP custody that some of those things may not be required.

Well, the government lawyer's argument was that these facilities are meant to be temporary, and so they don't need all these extra amenities. She's right. The facilities are meant to be temporary, but as we know and as we've been discussing, right now, they're not. Right now, kids are getting stuck there for weeks, up to a month.

Because of this delayed process of releasing them. Exactly. And how did the judge react in that case, knowing what you just explained? So the argument's actually being made before a three-judge panel, and all of the judges seem like they can't really believe what the government lawyer is saying. But are you arguing seriously that you do not read the agreement as requiring you to do something other than what I've just described?

Cold all night long, lights on all night long, sleep on the concrete, and you get an aluminum foil blanket, are you saying that that's okay? And took credit to lie down, which they also said. I find that inconceivable that the government would say that that is safe and sanitary. They're very openly shocked and openly disagree. One of the judges, A. Wallace Tashima, was actually imprisoned

in a Japanese internment camp during World War II, and he responded, It's within everybody's common understanding that, you know, if you don't have a toothbrush, if you don't have soap, if you don't have a blanket, it's not safe and sanitary. Wouldn't everybody agree to that? Do you agree to that? Well, I think it's, I think those are, there's fair reason to find that those things may be part of safe and sanitary. Are a part. What do you say maybe? You mean there are circumstances when a person doesn't need to have a toothbrush, toothpaste, and soap for days. That's not safe and sanitary.

Wouldn't everybody agree to that? Do you agree to that? And this exchange was recorded on video. It goes on the internet, and it ends up being watched by millions of people. So after your story is published describing these conditions in Clinton, and after this Trump administration lawyer's presentation is captured on video and people are outraged by it, what happens next? Within a few days, Clint is emptied. Most of the kids are transferred into long-term care run by the Health and Human Services Department.

A few are sent to a different overflow facility where the Border Patrol says the conditions are better because it's newer and it was built for families. And the head of the federal agency that is in control of Clint, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, John Sanders, resigns from his job. So this very much seems like the government acknowledging that there's a big problem here. the government acknowledging that there's a big problem here. It seems that way. But then almost immediately after, the Border Patrol tells us that they've moved more than 100 children back into Clint. Same facility.

The same facility. An official at the agency also tells myself and other reporters on a press call that he, quote, doesn't buy the allegations of the lawyers and the children in Clint. Basically thinks that they weren't accurately describing the conditions there. And on top of that, Border Patrol officials start to tell us that John Sanders' resignation had nothing to do with what was happening in Clint. Kaitlin, what has the president himself said about these conditions and these issues that you and these lawyers have raised. The conditions are terrible. I agree. And it's been that way for a long time. Do something.

And President Obama built the cages. Remember when they said that I built them? The president's response has pretty much been, one, it's not my fault, and two, it's not my problem. If the Democrats would change the asylum laws and the loopholes, which they refuse to do because they think it's good politics, everything would be solved immediately. But they refuse to do it. He blames the Democrats in Congress for not replacing existing immigration laws. He says it's unideal, but it's basically the result of all these other forces of human trafficking that's bringing people into the United States, of the Democrats' refusal to replace the existing immigration laws. Kind of just throws up his hands. I inherited separation from President Obama.

President Obama built, they call them jail cells. They were built by the Obama. Let's talk about what's happening now. Your administration, you're not doing the recreation. You're not even schooling these kids anymore. You've gotten rid of all that stuff. We're doing a fantastic job under the circumstances. The Democrats aren't even approving giving us money.

We'll be right back. Kaitlin, when you mention in Clint the lack of soap or showers or clean clothes, how exactly do we explain that? How does the government explain that? The government says that these facilities were not built for this population. And they're right. The facilities were built to house an entirely different population of border crossers, largely healthy adult men who would be housed for only a couple of hours before they were going to be deported back to Mexico. So they just don't have beds for children. They don't have showers for children.

That's true. The problem is that, as I said, the government has been dealing with an unprecedented influx of children since October of last year. So why are children still going into the exact same facilities that they were almost a year ago now? I mean, why hasn't the infrastructure changed? And what's the answer? It's a good question. I think part of it is limited resources, but part of it is also the way the government has chosen to use those resources. And we haven't seen a whole lot of effort put toward expanding facilities to make room for the children and families who are coming. And I've had Homeland Security officials say to me, if we make room, more people are going to come.

They talk about them like welcome centers. They say if we build welcome centers, all that's going to do is encourage more people to come. So the implication there, and let's be clear, it's an implication. It's not a clearly stated position, but the implication is that they don't want to make more space because they want to deter people from coming to the United States. So this may be a deterrent policy, these conditions we're seeing in some of these detention centers.

I think it's a deterrent policy and a statistical reality that's outside of the federal government's control. It's those two things, not one or the other. So whether or not it's the intent to deter migrants, is it having that effect? Are there fewer children arriving at the border since these conditions became public? You know, border crossings actually have started to go down in the last few weeks. But no one I talk to, including immigration officials, attributes it to conditions in detention centers. It's actually the result of changes that the

Mexican government has made under intense pressure from President Trump to police more aggressively people who are trying to cross through its country into the United States. They're blocking people from getting through. So what happens now? Will the conditions at these facilities improve or are they likely to stay the same? That's an open question because regardless of intentionality, all the agencies involved

with what's happening at the border have been responding to the criticism they've been facing by saying, we need more money. So in the last couple of weeks, Congress has set about negotiating over if and how to need more money. So in the last couple of weeks, Congress has set about negotiating over if and how to provide that money. Members, please carry your conversations

off the floor. Members. At the end of the last week, it looked like the agencies were going to get $4.5 billion to address this issue. A lot of money. But Democrats in Congress

had hoped to put a lot of provisions on it. And to be this issue, a lot of money. But Democrats in Congress had hoped to put a lot of provisions on it. And to be totally frank, we want to make sure there are protections built into this legislation so the funds are not misused, as they have been in the past, so we don't see any more children being abused, so we don't see the mismanagement that we have witnessed. To make sure that the money was going to be used to improve conditions there. However, the Senate, which is controlled by Republicans, was able to pressure Democrats in the House because of the urgency of the situation. Eight weeks ago, the administration sent Congress an urgent request for humanitarian money for the border.

They were able to say to Democrats, it's going to be your fault if you delay these negotiations and if children suffer for longer. But during all this time, our Democratic House colleagues have been unable to produce a clean measure to provide this humanitarian funding with any chance of becoming law. The Senate, as the Democrats described, basically wanted a blank check.

We already have our compromise. The Shelby Leahy Senate bill is the only game in town. Time to quit playing games. Time to make a law. And they got it. So we have to see how those funds are spent. I'm looking to see whether they go toward improving food, improving medical care,

improving beds and basic amenities, or if administration officials continue to argue that these facilities are meant to be temporary and that they shouldn't have to make them any more comfortable than they are right now. And what's the latest from Clint, Texas, where this all started for you? So our reporter, Simone Romero, got a tour of Clint last week. It's a lot less crowded than it was weeks ago, but he observed a lot of similar conditions that were reported originally.

He saw children as young as three years old pressing their faces up to the window to try to get attention in overcrowded cells, you know, cells with more than 20 little girls. He saw kids outside in over 100 degree heat. Agents who were showing him around pointed to shelves and said, look, we have soap, we have toothbrushes here. But the agents told journalists who were on this tour, they were not allowed to talk to any of the children. And since we almost never get access to these facilities, and when we do, we're not allowed to talk to the children who are in

them, we just don't know what kind of circumstances they're living in. Jalyn, thank you very much. Thank you. On Friday night, a federal judge issued an emergency order demanding that health and sanitation conditions improve at Border Patrol facilities across Texas, including Clint. The judge set a deadline of July 12th

for the government to report back on its progress. Here's what else you need to know today. I'd be very proud to do that. Okay, let's do it. On Sunday, President Trump became the first sitting U.S. president to set foot in North Korea, where he shook hands with its leader,

Kim Jong-un, before both men quickly returned to the South Korean side of the border. I just want to say that this is my honor. I didn't really expect it. We were in Japan for the G20. We came over and I said, hey, I'm over here. I want to call Chairman Kim. And we got to meet and stepping across that line was a great honor. Trump and Kim agreed to restart negotiations on a nuclear agreement, despite repeated setbacks in their previous talks

and Kim's unwillingness so far to give up his nuclear arsenal, a key demand from the Trump administration. In remarks after returning to South Korea, Kim praised Trump for a historic gesture of diplomacy, saying, quote, I believe just looking at this action, it is an expression of his willingness to eliminate all the unfortunate past and open a new future. And, tens of thousands of demonstrators returned to to streets across Sudan on Sunday in a resurgence of protests that had been broken up in a deadly government crackdown that killed dozens of people earlier in the month. The protesters, who succeeded in bringing down their longtime dictator, Omar al-Bashir, have been demanding a civilian-led government to replace the military-led council

that took power after Bashir was ousted. In the capital city of Khartoum, the protesters clashed with security forces who used tear gas and shot at several civilians. That's it for The Daily. I'm Michael Bavaro. See you tomorrow.