Those whining about this simply need to shut up. Since when did being those who break our nationÂ’s immigration laws become entitled to reside in Hilton-like accommodations?

Brushing aside human rights complaints, the White House on Tuesday defended the use of a converted jail in Central Texas to detain families facing deportation – a facility where mothers and children are kept behind razor wire and clothed in prisonlike garb.

"It's difficult to find facilities," said Tony Snow, President Bush's press secretary, dismissing the suggestion that a less restrictive environment would be more appropriate.

"In the past, children had been separated from their families," he said. "What we're actually trying to do is to keep them together."

Detainees wear navy uniforms that come in sizes small enough to fit a newborn.
The 512-bed T. Don Hutto Family Residential Facility, just northeast of Austin, opened in May – a response to complaints about the so-called "catch-and-release" policy that let illegal immigrants from countries other than Mexico remain free pending hearings set weeks or months later.

Refugee advocates and civil rights groups complain that the detention center, run by Corrections Corporation of America, a company that specializes in private prisons, remains very much a prison. And they say such a setting is inappropriate for families. The 8-by-8 cells always are unlocked but have only narrow slits for windows.

Well too, freakinÂ’ bad! Jail is what happens when you break the law.

But what are the actual conditions/services provided?

Gary Mead, assistant director for the detention and removal operations at ICE, led a news media tour Friday and emphasized that children receive five hours of schooling each day, have access to a computer lab and gym, and get good medical care, despite complaints to the contrary.

Most of the detainees are Latin Americans from countries other than Mexico, though the center, in Taylor, Texas, drew much of its notoriety as home to three Dallas-area Palestinian families in recent months. One of those families was deported to Jordan. The others were recently released.

In other words, these folks are receiving decent treatment, with adequate provision made for the children. The other option is to place the children in foster care pending the outcome of status hearings, with the parents to remain locked up in a much more restrictive facility. But then the advocates for the criminal aliens would be complaining about the separation of parents from their children, wouldnÂ’t they?

Of course, maybe that foster care idea isn’t a bad one. Indeed, it would be a good way of ensuring that the most appropriate course of action be taken when parents are deported – their parental rights to their children born in the United States could be terminated upon the issuance of a deportation order and the children declared immediately eligible for adoption by their foster families. That would certainly solve the anchor baby problem, and make illegal immigration to this country a much less attractive option for millions of border-jumpers.

Posted by: Greg at 12:20 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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