ACLU calls on Biden administration to close dozens of ICE detention facilities

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) on Wednesday urged the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to close dozens of immigration detention facilities as part of a renewed push for President Biden to follow through on several campaign pledges now that he's been in office for 100 days.

In a letter to DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas shared first with CBS News, the ACLU identified 39 detention centers used by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) that it believes should be shut down due to reports of abuse against detainees, limited access to lawyers and insufficient justification for opening them.  "With lower ICE arrest rates and already-reduced levels of detention arising from the COVID-19 pandemic, ICE is currently paying to maintain thousands of empty beds, at enormous taxpayer expense — wasting hundreds of millions of dollars that would be better spent on alternatives to detention and other programmatic priorities," the ACLU wrote in its letter Wednesday.