1. United States
2. N.C.
3. Letter

I am writing as your constituent to urge you to cosponsor and support S. 3702: Dignity for Detained Immigrants Act. The current immigration detention system is a stain on our nation's values. We are detaining families with children in prison-like conditions, holding vulnerable asylum seekers and torture survivors in solitary confinement, and allowing private corporations to profit from human suffering. This is not who we are as a country. S. 3702 takes overdue steps to restore basic human dignity to people in our custody—a moral imperative that transcends political ideology. Beyond the moral imperative, this bill makes fiscal sense. Private detention companies lobby aggressively to expand detention policies so they can fill their beds and increase profits. Mandatory detention rules force us to hold people who pose no flight risk or danger, driving up costs unnecessarily. S. 3702 eliminates private detention, allows judges to use common sense about who actually needs to be detained, and redirects scarce resources away from unnecessary imprisonment. We can enforce immigration law effectively without warehousing families and vulnerable people at enormous taxpayer expense. Right now, detention facilities operate with minimal oversight and accountability. People are held in dangerous, unsanitary conditions with limited access to legal representation. Abuses go unpunished. S. 3702 establishes enforceable civil detention standards, mandates unannounced inspections, and allows Congressional members to monitor facilities directly. This ensures that federal detention programs meet basic standards of decency and transparency. We can have strong immigration enforcement and still treat detained people humanely. Other nations do it. S. 3702 is not radical—it simply ends the most egregious practices and creates accountability for taxpayer-funded detention programs. I urge you to support this bill. You can do the right thing here by standing up for human rights AND fiscal responsibility.