LOS ANGELES -- The Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights (CHIRLA), the largest immigrant rights organization in California, welcomes parts of President Biden’s FY22 budget that reconfigure this country's immigration priorities by expanding detention alternatives, providing deportation defense for some immigrants and helping refugees and lone children. But the plan still devotes too much taxpayer money to jailing and deporting immigrants, and the emphasis is still on regarding them as criminals. The request of $16.3 billion for Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and $8.4 billion for ICE continues outsize spending on border surveillance technology and more agents who tear families apart. Funding 32,500 detention beds, and 2,500 for processing of families, still means that detention numbers remain high and the administration continues to rely too much on putting immigrants in cages, despite its expressions of concern. Merely stopping construction of the wall is not enough. We need more detail on how, for example, $440 million destined for alternatives to detention will help immigrants navigate the system. The budget request for the Department of Justice is also concerning. While there appears to be money to help some unaccompanied children and families defend against deportation, there are also proposals on court backlogs that will likely undermine due process. Meantime, prosecutors continue to use racist laws to prosecute immigrants. CHIRLA calls for the Biden administration to divest from enforcement and invest in people. Government funding should not harm our communities. Please attribute the following statements to Angelica Salas, CHIRLA executive director: “This is a missed opportunity but not a lost one. We demand a budget that more clearly marks a shift away from the deportation machinery that has grown out of all proportion in the past two decades. This budget's investments in immigrants are simply too timid, given the trauma inflicted by the previous administration and the wounds inflicted by the pandemic. We want to work with the administration and Congress to increase funding for immigrant integration and naturalization and to help immigrants defend themselves in immigration court. As we begin to emerge from the ravages of the COVID-19 pandemic, the suffering of immigrants, and their essential contributions, require no less.” | 
