"The federal watchdog system at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that oversees complaints about civil rights violations, including in immigration detention, has been gutted so thoroughly that it could be laying the groundwork for the Trump administration to abuse people with impunity, experts warn. Former federal oversight officials have sounded the alarm at the rapid dismantling of guardrails against human rights failures at the same time as the government pushes aggressive immigration enforcement operations."
"A group of fired watchdogs has filed a whistleblower complaint to Congress through the Government Accountability Project (GAP), and a coalition of human rights organizations sued the administration, demanding the employees be reinstated. There is deepening concern that a system of oversight that was already weak is now hanging by a thread, even as criticism surges over treatment of detainees in the ballooning immigration jail network."
The Department of Homeland Security's oversight system that handles civil-rights complaints, including those arising in immigration detention, has been deeply weakened. Hundreds of federal oversight officials were fired early in the administration, leaving monitoring capacities diminished. Fired watchdogs filed a whistleblower complaint to Congress through the Government Accountability Project and a coalition of human-rights groups sued the government seeking reinstatement. Advocates warn that the collapse of oversight creates a blank check for impunity and enables operations without rules that could maximize brutality to facilitate mass deportation. DHS officials have publicly denied substandard conditions in immigration custody.
Read at www.theguardian.com
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]