A new Washington Post report takes a close look at the $1 billion contract given to the nation’s largest prison company by the federal government to build a facility in the South Texas town of Dilley to detain women and children seeking asylum.
The Post report describes the contract as “an unusual arrangement,” in which the Corrections Corporation of America is paid no matter how many people are detained in the facility. In recent months, the Dilley facility has been just half full but that one center accounts for 14 percent of the CCA’s revenue.
Laura Lichter, a Denver immigration and asylum attorney, told the Post, “This was about the best thing that could happen to private detention since sliced bread.”
CCA has benefited from a change to a tougher policy under the Obama administration on asylum seekers. The Post reported that the U.S. government kept fewer than 100 beds for family detention at the outset of Obama’s presidency but that had jumped to more than 3,000 by the close of 2014.