Your daily adult tube feed all in one place!
The southern state where detained migrants sleep with snakes and are served maggots and filthy water
The 6,000 foreigners caged in Louisiana's immigration lockups don't have it easy.
They complain of being served paltry meals infested with maggots, mold, and rat poop.
Their cells, they say, are grimy and often smell of vomit and feces.
At night, they bed down with snakes, cockroaches, and spiders crawling around nearby.
When they complain, they're typically laughed at or face retaliation from guards.
Conditions in Louisiana's nine migrant lockups are so bad they amount to 'torture,' researchers say
At night, detainees bed down with snakes, cockroaches, and spiders crawling around.
That's according to a shocking report from human rights groups about the nine migrant lockups in the Bayou State.
Sarah Decker, one of the report's lead authors, calls them 'black sites' in America's immigration system.
The federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency uses Louisiana as a 'national detention and deportation hub shielded from public scrutiny,' says Decker.
'They've picked an area of the country that is extremely remote and isolated, and they're transferring people from all over the country to these jails,' she adds.
Her 107-page report comes as illegal migration stands as a top issue in the 2024 election race between Vice President Kamala Harris and former president Donald Trump.
Louisiana's migrant lockups will doubtless get busier should Trump win in November and deliver on a promise to detain and then deport millions of foreigners who don't have papers.
Harris meanwhile has hardened her stance on migration.
She's vowed to spend millions on wall-building at the frontier, after record-breaking people flows across it during her time in the Biden Administration.
An Ipsos poll from May showed that most voters support a mass deportation.
More than a third want to see massive camps built to process them out of the country — part of Trump's plan.
The report on Louisiana puts a spotlight on life inside the sprawling detention system.
Though immigration hawks may say that harsh and unsanitary conditions deter Central Americans and others from entering the US illegally, the researchers say they're so bad they amount to 'torture.'
Researchers looked at the nine migrant lockups across central and northern Louisiana
Detainees toil for as little as $1 a day in a state where temperatures can exceed 100°F
More than half of Americans want to see mass roundups and deportations of undocumented immigrants
They interviewed more than 6,200 people held in nine Louisiana detention centers under the purview of the New Orleans ICE field office over a two-year period.
They paint a devastating picture of a miserable life in the facilities, eight of which are run by private contractors that have funded various politicians' campaigns.
The report — Inside the Black Hole — was written by Decker's group RFK Human Rights, the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Immigration Project, and Immigration Services and Legal Advocacy.
On any given day more than 6,000 people, comprising recently arrived asylum seekers as well as longer-term US residents from other countries, are caged by ICE in Louisiana.
It's the second-largest state for immigration detention behind Texas, which has about 11,600 detainees.
Many of its facilities are former jails and prisons that were emptied after legal reforms in the 2010s
The report says some detainees were transported to Louisiana from the border shackled in five-point restraints for as many as 26 hours.
In that time, they were unable to use the restroom or eat and drink, and were left with deep cuts on their wrists and legs.
Detainees described 'giant rat' infestations, black mold, leaking ceilings and food clearly marked with expiration dates long passed and infested with worms and larvae.
One of the detainees, Mariia, 30, who was fleeing persecution in her native Russia, reported pest-infested food and foul water at a women-only facility for 750 in Basile, in central Louisiana.
'We saw snakes,' Mariia told researchers.
'It was scary to try to sleep and always find something crawling on the wall or on your mattress, spiders and different kinds of bugs.'
Other female detainees said they were denied menstrual products.
Those in solitary confinement reported going without clean laundry and bedding for as long as three months.
Many spoke of being denied medical care, resulting in serious complications.
Detainees at one lockup say they were often woken at 3am for tiny breakfast portions.
The numbers of migrants caged in Louisiana has surged during the Biden Administration
Detainees say they've been exposed to coronavirus and complain of conditions harmful to health
Cockroaches are a common problem in the moldy cells of Louisiana's lockups
Some toiled for $1 a day performing menial tasks, the report says.
But when they went to spend their earnings in the facility’s store, they found that a single bag of Doritos was priced at $9.
ICE detainees are not guaranteed legal representation, and the report alleges that the lockups routinely deny them access to legal libraries and translation services.
In a statement, ICE's New Orleans Field Office rejected the findings and said it is committed to the health and welfare of migrants.
'The agency continuously reviews and enhances civil detention operations to ensure noncitizens are treated humanely, protected from harm, provided appropriate medical and mental health care, and receive the rights and protections to which they are entitled,' it said.
A spokesperson for GEO Group, which holds the contracts to operate four of the centers probed in the report, accused the researchers of being politically biased.
'GEO categorically denies such allegations and stands by our provision of contract compliant support services in accordance with all established federal standards,' the spokesperson told Bloomberg.
The Biden Administration released the latest border crossing numbers earlier this month, showing a 32 percent drop in migrants caught in July — what the feds call the 'lowest number since September 2020.'
The staggering decrease in migrant crossings comes four years into the worst border crisis the US has ever seen — with historic numbers of migrants arriving at the nation's border's seeking entry — including a huge number of asylum seekers.
Since October 2021, over 10 million migrants have crossed into the US, according to federal statistics — straining the federal agencies that handle migrants and bringing border communities, like El Paso, Texas, to its knees.
Since January, the Mexican government has stepped up efforts to stop mostly South and Central American migrants traveling through its country on their way to the US.
Pressured by the Biden Administration, Mexican officials have set up checkpoints to find migrants on northbound buses and trains and return them to the Mexico-Guatemala international boundary.
In June, the White House announced changes how migrants could seek asylum at the border.
Any migrant who did not legally enter the US would be removed and not allowed to seek asylum.