Columbia Standard

U.S. Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin and U.S. Senator Adam Schiff have led a group of Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats in expressing their opposition to the Trump Administration's plan to use Bureau of Prisons (BOP) facilities for detaining immigrants. The Senators sent a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi, voicing concerns about this policy, which they describe as a revival from President Trump's first administration.

The letter highlights allegations of mistreatment and unconstitutional detention conditions experienced by detained immigrants during the previous Trump Administration. The Senators stated: "We write to object to the recent decision to use Federal Bureau of Prisons facilities to detain immigrants swept up in the Trump Administration’s mass deportation efforts and urge you to reconsider this plan." They emphasized that many detainees, including asylum seekers, lacked access to essential services such as legal counsel, religious rights, phone calls, educational programming, and clean clothing.

Concerns were also raised regarding a memo from BOP’s Correctional Programs Branch dated February 7th. The Senators criticized the memo for failing "to provide meaningful guidance and direction to staff on the serious questions raised by these instructions," including how civil immigration detainees would interact with existing criminally incarcerated populations.

The letter further outlines ongoing staffing and infrastructure challenges within BOP facilities. The Senators cited labor unions and past Senate Judiciary Committee hearings as evidence of these issues. Understaffing was described as "one symptom of chronic underinvestment in the Bureau," with maintenance needs being characterized as a "foundational, enterprise-wide challenge" costing approximately $3 billion.

The letter concludes by summarizing the difficulties facing BOP that make immigration detention problematic: “Until serious funding and staffing challenges outlined above are addressed, federal prisons simply cannot safely and humanely meet the needs of its current inmate population, much less the needs of civil immigration detainees."

In addition to Durbin and Schiff, U.S. Senators Sheldon Whitehouse, Mazie Hirono, Cory Booker, Alex Padilla, and Peter Welch signed the letter.

Durbin has been active in overseeing BOP operations during his tenure as Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee. He revived annual BOP oversight hearings starting in April 2021 and has addressed issues like chronic understaffing. His efforts have included calling for reform-minded leadership at BOP following reports of misconduct within the organization.

Durbin's continued focus on prison oversight was evident in subsequent hearings held in September 2022 and September 2023. In February 2024, he convened a hearing titled “Examining and Preventing Deaths of Incarcerated Individuals in Federal Prisons,” where Director Peters testified on related operational issues.