Earlier this month, President Obama announced a historic reform to the nation's federal prison system. After a series of harrowing reports by government and independent investigators, the Department of Justice said that it would no longer contract with private corporations to run the nation's federal prisons. This was an important first step in fixing our broken criminal justice system. But there is much more to do. The DOJ's order does not apply to the management of federal immigration detention facilities. Some of these facilities, run by private corporations, hold undocumented immigrant families – -including thousands of women and children — in conditions characterized by gross negligence, and where cases of physical and sexual abuse are common. We joined our sister organizations on the National Hispanic Leadership Agenda coalition to call on President Obama and the Department of Justice to end corporate management of immigration detention facilities. The corporate managers of these facilities have earned billions in profits from providing substandard care to immigrant families in direct opposition to American law and values.
