A search for asylum: Bill to ban civil immigration detainment contracts passes House

SANTA FE — When federal officials released former dreamer Edwin Jesus Garcia Castillo from civil detainment in New Mexico to await his asylum hearing with his family in Tennessee, he was happy. But he also had to leave behind about 300 men in what he described as an unsanitary and inhumane facility, none of whom spoke English.

“Even dogs at dog shelters get treated better,” Garcia Castillo said, tears in his eyes.

The New Mexico House on Friday, after a three-hour debate, voted 35-25 to pass the Immigrant Safety Act, which would bar New Mexico municipalities from entering into or renewing agreements with federal agencies such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to detain immigrants for civil violations. The push comes amid the Trump administration’s promised mass deportations and even the consideration to hold thousands of undocumented immigrants at military bases, including in New Mexico.

House Bill 9 would shut down the three private detention centers in New Mexico — in Torrance, Cibola and Otero counties — that operate via intergovernmental service agreements between local counties and ICE.

ICE held Garcia Castillo, 26, at the Torrance County Detention Facility.

Garcia Castillo’s life has included cartel kidnappings and a search for asylum in the U.S. — but also one where he’s made it out alive. Not everyone can say the same, said Jessica Inez Martinez with the New Mexico Immigrant Law Center.

The duo is working together to advocate for immigrant-related legislation in the Roundhouse, some of which have failed time and time again. But, Martinez said, the efforts carry a heavier consequence this year under the Trump administration.

“This bill is our ability to disentangle ourselves from this very corrupt scheme that exists,” Martinez said, “because we know that private companies are using our local governments to bypass procurement processes so that they can sign these intergovernmental service agreements without … disclosing conditions.”

New Mexico has five times more detention center bed space per capita than the average state, according to Martinez. The state’s three detention centers have the capacity to hold 2,000 people and all are full, according to the Immigrant Law Center.

“We are basically putting our people up on a platter for this laboratory for cruelty,” Martinez said.

Rep. Rod Montoya, R-Farmington, on the floor, failed to amend the bill to institute an automatic repeal of it after 30 days in the event that a federal employee, agency or entity notifies a loss of federal dollars as a result of the Immigrant Safety Act.

He specifically brought up the loss of Medicaid money, upon which New Mexico relies heavily. Bill sponsor Rep. Andrea Romero, D-Santa Fe, rebutted the amendment by saying the Trump administration could use a slew of reasons to take money away from New Mexico, not just HB9.

Rep. Stefani Lord, R-Sandia Park, said she feared a loss of jobs and economic dollars, an argument that has come up in past years of the bill’s debates.

“We’re going to be defiant to the federal government, and we’re going to say we necessarily don’t really care what’s going to happen to our citizens,” she said, “because they’re the ones who are going to pay the price, because we’re missing out on these millions of dollars.”

She added that the detained immigrants would end up in detention somewhere else.

Garcia Castillo said valuing money over human lives is what “crosses the line between humans and animals.” “Life is precious, he said. “You only get one.”

Martinez brought up the case of Roxana Hernandez, a transgender immigrant who sought asylum from Honduras. On May 9, 2018, Hernandez requested admission into the U.S., according to ICE. She died on May 25 after about two weeks in detainment.

Immigrant advocacy groups attributed the death to medical neglect while in detainment, though ICE said it provided thorough medical services. Martinez said Hernandez could’ve died as a result of deportation for her identity as a trans woman but ended up dying in the U.S. anyway seeking safety.

Martinez said it’s reflective of the bill’s changed name this year. Formerly known as the “Dignity Not Detention” bill, it’s now dubbed the Immigrant Safety Act.

“The facility made 50 cents at the time (from Hernandez) — it’s an average of 50 cents per day per detainee. They made like $5 on her life to be complicit in her death,” Martinez said. “And so when we’re talking about the economic impacts, I think it’s important to acknowledge that they’re not generating a whole lot of money, yet that has outweighed the cost of human life.”

Martinez said the bill is on a strong legal footing, as specific as possible to uphold in court. HB9 heads to the Senate now, where the bill has failed to pass multiple times in the past.

“The real question of this bill is much deeper: Now that we know that immigrants are under siege, will New Mexico take the stance to protect immigrants?”

Other immigration protection bills are also making their way through the Roundhouse, including a measure to bar the state and political subdivisions from using public resources to help identify and arrest immigrants without legal status residing in the U.S. The legislation, Senate Bill 250, passed the Senate Health and Public Affairs Committee on a 5-4, party-line vote Wednesday, much to the dismay of Republicans who said it’s unjust to enforce some laws and not others.

ICE didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Said Sen. Angel Charley, D-Acoma of SB250: “We must resist mass deportation to continue protecting belonging in New Mexico.”

‘We’re not criminals, but we are in a jail’

Garcia Castillo was born in Chihuahua, Mexico. His parents legally immigrated to the U.S. when he was about 1 year old, and he eventually obtained a Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program status.

Six years ago, Garcia Castillo was arrested in Tennessee on an accusation of domestic assault. Despite his accuser dropping the charges, the court held him on a misdemeanor for provocative actions and sent him to a Louisiana detention center for several months. A judge ultimately revoked his DACA status and deported him.

Garcia Castillo recalled what a change of worlds it was to physically cross into Mexico, a country he hadn’t been to since he was a baby.

“I remember that I got to the borderline and I didn’t want to cross. … I had one foot on one side and the other foot on the other side, and then an immigration officer was walking towards me, yelling at me that he was going to have me arrested for illegally crossing if I didn’t get the other foot on the other side.

“And one of the people ended up grabbing me and pulling me. I entered, and I remember the sun hit me differently. The air hit me differently,” he said.

A few days later, cartel members kidnapped him. His parents paid a ransom for his release, around half a million pesos, but before Garcia Castillo could leave, he was forced to watch the torture of a competing cartel member from Chihuahua, where he was on his way.

“They told me when I get to Chihuahua to make sure I let them know that this is a cartel they don’t want to mess with,” Garcia Castillo said. “I still have dreams about that to this day. I still hear that man screaming, and it’s something that will be with me forever.”

He said the person who escorted him to Chihuahua upon his release was a Mexican federal police officer.

Garcia Castillo said he ended up getting kidnapped by cartel members three times during his four years living in Mexico, targeted for having American money and a relatively good-paying job in Mexico. The final time, he escaped on U.S. soil, where he asked border officials for asylum.

He spent a few days in a shelter in El Paso, Albergue las Carpas, before officials transferred him to New Mexico’s Torrance County Detention Facility.

His recounted experience there reflects that of 2022 reports from the federal Office of the Inspector General: staffing shortages, delayed access to medical care, unsafe and unsanitary facility conditions and insufficient access to legal services.

Garcia Castillo said, as someone who spoke English and relatively understood immigrants’ rights, he became a sort of advocate for those who didn’t know any better — people who were being deceived into signing English documents for their deportation, people who hadn’t been outside in months because of staffing issues.

“A lot of these people that I met were doctors, were lawyers, were painters, were mechanics, were chefs, kids in universities, kids in high school. I met a father and son. I met two brothers. I saw a lot of older folks and (people from) different countries,” he said. “Met two men from China that were fleeing because they didn’t want to be the religion that their country was trying to make them be or just their sexual orientation that wasn’t accepted.”

The best thing he did, Garcia Castillo said, was help save five men, all around his father’s age in their late 40s or early 50s, from committing suicide.

“We’re not criminals, but we are in a jail,” Garcia Castillo said.

“It’s just really hard because people are coming to this country to help them to live a better life, to live a safe life, and the first thing (the U.S. does) is … lock them up, make them go through these processes. It breaks them down, mentally and physically,” he added.

He spent 14 days at Torrance before officials released him pending an asylum court hearing in July.

“When I left, I was happy because I was going to see mom and dad, brother and sister. And at the same time, it was really hard because I was leaving a lot of men behind,” he said.

A lot of immigrants are afraid of persecution if they speak up about their experiences, Garcia Castillo said, but he’s not.

“I don’t have any fear anymore,” he said. “I lost that a long time ago.”