Legislative Memo: The Dignity Not Detention Act

The detention of immigrants for civil immigration violations is a national disgrace. Across the country, tens of thousands of people who have come to the United States fleeing persecution or seeking a better life for their families are held in county jails and federal detention facilities. This occurs here in New York, where several counties contract with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to detain people in local jails, helping to maintain an unjust immigration detention system.

The NYCLU strongly supports the Dignity Not Detention Act, which would end these contracts between ICE and county jails, and ensure that New York is not complicit in upholding a fundamentally unjust immigration detention system.