ICE closes illegal hotline after being featured in a popular TV series

In episode 5 of season 7 of the popular Netflix series Orange Is the New Black, a heroine named Maritza, sitting in an immigration detention center, learns about a free hotline through which she can get a free lawyer. Another girl, Gloria, warns her: “Be careful. If they find out you're using the hotline, Big Brother will shut it down." This is exactly what happened in real life.

Фото: Depositphotos

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has shut down an existing immigration detention hotline run by the California-based group Immigrant Freedom, attorneys say, less than two weeks after the hotline's very existence was highly visible. was featured in a TV show, writes Los Angeles Times.

On August 22, Freedom for Immigrants, an organization that runs visiting programs in detention centers across the country, responded to the line shutdown with a letter arguing that the shutdown was a violation of free speech and amounted to government retaliation in an attempt to silence an ongoing crisis. immigration.

Six actors from Orange Is the New Black and more than 100 organizations signed a letter to ICE acting director Matthew Albans demanding that the line be restored.

The hotline was featured as part of a segment on immigration detention in the show's 7th season, which aired on July 26. After two characters find themselves in deportation proceedings, they learn that immigrants are not entitled to a free phone call after being detained. They learn about the “Freedom for Immigrants” hotline - the heroines begin to distribute the number to other people in the institution.

“Even a free hotline cannot be taken away simply because the government is currently unhappy with how we share information with the public about what is happening,” said Christina Fiaglio, co-executive director of Freedom for Immigrants.

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ICE told Freedom for Immigrants that the toll-free numbers of lawyers and volunteer organizations must be approved by the Immigration Verification Executive Office, which oversees immigration courts. Agency representatives also added that those numbers that no longer appear on the EOIR list will be deleted from the system. These are extensions issued by the Talton Communications telephone service provider, as 1-800 numbers do not work in places of detention. Detainees must pay for calls to all other numbers.

Freedom for Immigrants has supported a national free hotline for detained immigrants since 2013. In some months, the organization received 14 000 calls from detainees across the country, many of whom were held in rural institutions, and they did not have money to call friends or relatives. Volunteers working on telephone lines connect immigrants with lawyers, help them collect the necessary documents for the immigration case and file complaints about violations of rights and abuse.

Last year, the ICE forbade a volunteer group to visit people at the Otai Mesa Detention Center in San Diego after its members refused to sign a non-disclosure agreement about conditions of detention. Less than a week after the organization sent an letter to ICE alleging that the measure was repressive, the agency limited the previously operating hotline to eight facilities in Florida.

In response, Rep. Juan Vargas and 14 other members of Congress sent a letter to the ICE Deputy Director asking for more information and expressing concern about such restrictions.

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On August 7, shortly after the episode "Orange Is the New Black" aired, the line was closed to its remaining Florida properties. Fialho said her group now has a regular phone number, which costs several thousand dollars a month, so it can offer free calls to inmates.

Earlier, Freedom for Immigrants had three hotline numbers so that volunteers could receive more calls, but the other two were already closed. Fiallo said the ICE closed one of the extensions at the request of the Bristol County Prison in Massachusetts shortly after an article with this information was published in a local newspaper. According to her, Fiallo received a similar response from ICE to remove numbers from the system that are not in the approved EOIR list. Freedom for Immigrants has never been on this list, but the organization has been given extension numbers anyway.

Laura Gomez, an actress in Orange Is the New Black, said she was “heartbroken” after learning about the elimination of the hotline.

“We see life imitating art in the most destructive ways,” she said. “I wish this was a fictional situation and we were exaggerating the reality, but in reality it’s the other way around.”

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