ICE agents are ramping up aggression and state leaders must defend Washingtonians.
Continuing his slide into fascism, Donald Trump has now unleashed federal immigration enforcement agents across our country, openly attacking, injuring, murdering, and imprisoning immigrants, citizens, advocates, children, old people, our friends and neighbors, and the people we depend upon for wellbeing.
In Seattle, three residents were kidnapped by the U.S. Department of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) this week. Meanwhile, in Minneapolis, ICE personnel executed Renee Good, an American citizen, mom, poet, and wife, who was actually trying to avoid a confrontation with ICE.
We protest, as we should, but our legislature can do much more than protest.
In Tacoma, the state of Washington has its very own ICE penal colony, operated by the GEO company. At any one time, 1500 people are imprisoned this detention facility. Their imprisonment is in direct violation of Article 1, Section 3 of the Washington state constitution. That “personal rights” article states: “No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.”
Having a private profit-making prison in our state is an insult to all of us and an assault on those who are taken prisoner with no due process. Additionally, this violates Article 1, Section 13 of our state constitution which states: “The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless in case of rebellion or invasion the public safety requires it.”
None of the people in the ICE prison have been afforded due process. They have been forcibly picked up by ICE. We should not stand by and just watch. The state Attorney General should go after the GEO company for violation of the state’s constitution and demand due process for those incarcerated, and immediate release from imprisonment.
GEO is a private for-profit company registered to operate in Washington state as a foreign limited liability company. In 2017, then Attorney General Bob Ferguson filed a lawsuit against GEO for paying incarcerated people $1 a day for cleaning and maintenance work at the facility (while GEO was receiving from ICE $100 a day for each of these people). At that time, GEO’s profit from the Tacoma facility was $20 million annually.
GEO was also ordered to hand over $17 million in back wages, plus $6 million for “unjust enrichment.” What did GEO do? In typical Trumpian fashion, it appealed the decision.
Even though GEO has failed to pay back wages to incarcerated people, Washington state just renewed its license in December, with “no disciplinary action.”
It is time for Washington Attorney General Nick Brown to review and rescind GEO’s business license.
GEO gets $165 a day for each incarcerated person. The average stay is 64 days, before the detainee is sent out of our country or released back to his or her home in Washington. That’s over $10,500 per detainee from the federal government to GEO. That adds up to $90 million a year, to enhance GEO’s bottom line. GEO expects to have an annual profit in 2025 of between $455 million to $465 million.
In 2003, the state of Washington helped to launch this insult to humanity with a loan of $57 million from the Washington Economic Development Finance Authority. In 2011, the Washington Economic Development Finance Authority loaned GEO another $54.4 million.
Our state government can not only loan money to dubious entities, it can also tax these entities. That’s exactly what our legislators should be doing… next week. The state Legislature should penalize GEO by making imprisonment without due process untenable in Washington. The Legislature could tax GEO $50 a day for every person in their custody, all of whom are victims of GEO’s violation of due process. That would be easy to track, as GEO has to keep an “inventory” of the people it locks up. Such a tax would bring in over $25 million annually. This could even force GEO to close up shop in Washington to protect their profits.
Such a tax could be replicated by states across the country. We could launch this effort to bankrupt GEO, ICE’s accomplice, across our country. Such a move would show the constitution is still in force, and it still is our country.
As patriotic Washingtonians, we must stand up to ICE. We also must stand up to GEO. Our own state government financed their facility. So, now our legislature must tax GEO, ICE’s private sector profiteering partner in beating down immigrants. Diminishing the profits of corporate imprisoners should be at the top of our agenda, for our Governor, our Legislature, and everyone else.
John Burbank (Guest Contributor)
John Burbank founded the Seattle-based Economic Opportunity Institute in 1998 and led it until his retirement in 2021.