With a planned capacity of 2,400 beds to hold mothers and children, the immigrant detention center that recently opened in Dilley, Texas, is the largest in the country.
But immigrant rights groups say the facility is largely unnecessary.
A large number of the undocumented children and mothers detainees detained at Dilley are likely eligible to apply for asylum and could be monitored using alternatives to detention, immigrant rights advocates and an immigration lawyer said on a call with reporters Wednesday.
Most of the women and children have suffered violence and persecution in their home countries in Central America, according to Christina Brown, an attorney with the American Immigration Lawyers Association.
Brown represented undocumented women and children detained at a temporary facility in Artesia, New Mexico, last year, and noted that her clients had a high rate of establishing credible claims for asylum. She http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_school called the Dilley detention center "utterly unnecessary and quite costly."
"Nearly all the women and children held at Dilley are asylum seekers, the vast majority of whom have legitimate asylum claims," said Brown.
It costs between $266 and $300 per person per day to lock someone up at Dilley, according to Royce Bernstein Murray, a policy director with the National Immigration Justice Center.
Murray said the children and mothers housed at Dilley don't represent a danger to society, and could be monitored by other means like ankle bracelets, in-person reporting and unannounced home visits. Such alternatives cost between 17 cents and $17 dollars per person per day, according to the American Civil Liberties Union.
"We're really talking about astronomical sums of money," said Murray, "when alternatives to detention exist for this very low-risk population."
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