The horrific spectre of Guantanamo, the torture camp set up to allow the U.S. to avoid due process rights, and which we’ve been fighting most of this century, is spreading within the U.S. as the Trump fascist regime rounds up “immigrants,” with threats against U.S. citizens and people they don’t like.
Guantanamo: Andy Worthington, who has covered the offshore camp for decades, reports that, in addition to the 15 “war on terror” prisoners still held there, Trump is expanding the population.
“Shocking news from Guantanamo, as 72 migrants from 26 countries are held, with the Department of Homeland Security having posted the names of 26 of these men, including a British national, alleging that all of them have been convicted of serious crimes. Given the recent ‘rendition’ of eight other migrants to an unknown fate in South Sudan — all, also, allegedly convicted of serious crimes — I ask if these men can also expect to be sent to one of the seven countries around the world (out of 58 targeted) who have so far bowed to U.S. pressure to take in migrants who are not their own citizens.” Below, men arriving in GTMO.
CECOT, the Terrorism Confinement Center of the president of El Salvador, holds 40,000 prisoners. It is way beyond the routine level of abuse and torture that is already meted out in U.S. prisons. Dozens are crammed into a single cell, with no mattresses, no sheets, no eating utensils, little food, and no privacy. No books, no rehabilitation or educational programs (other than Bible study!), no family or attorney visits, no phone calls or virtual meetings. No time outdoors (they get 30 minutes of indoor exercise.) Punishment can (officially) involve solitary confinement in a completely dark hole in the ground with only an air hole, for up to 15 days.
Despite objections from U.S. federal courts, backed up by no enforcement, the U.S. sent hundreds of men there in February, saying they were criminals. Credible reports say many were Venezuelans who had come to the U.S. legally.
Alligator Alcatraz is run by Department of Homeland Security on historically Seminole land in Florida. Put together in 8 days, it’s a collection of tents and trailers with little infrastructure to support thousands of human lives. The sign below indicates that rather than being a nickname for some generic facility, Alligator Alcatraz is the actual name of this concentration camp. Florida lawmakers were given a tour, reporting afterward that conditions outraged them.
How many people realize that in addition to the huge cuts in Medicaid/SNAP and so many social services, Trump’s Big Fascist Bill expands the architecture of state repression?
Revcom.us reports: “ICE is being ‘super-sized,’ with the stated goal of deporting a million people a year! This reflects the fact that — amidst all the diverse ‘currents’ of the MAGA movement — the fear and hatred of immigrants has been forged as the leading edge. Trump demonizes millions of immigrants — ordinary people, including millions of children — as ‘dangerous criminals who poison the blood of America..’
$45 billion has reportedly been allotted to dramatically expand ICE’s ‘detention facilities.’ That is 62 percent more than the budget of the whole U.S. Bureau of Prisons, which oversees 122 federal prisons. Given Trump’s performance at what he called ‘Alligator Alcatraz,’ coupled with the lavish praise he has poured on the nightmare prisons in El Salvador, it seems clear that these ‘detention facilities’ will be little more than a network of concentration camps and torture centers.”
Today, Good Trouble Lives On protests, Thursday July 17, will focus on egregious attacks on rights of the people. Find the event nearest to you and be there!
Refuse Fascism says “Our rights, the lives of millions of immigrants and others, and the future of humanity are in cardiac arrest. We need emergency intervention now” and is calling for “no business as usual starting Monday July 28.”