Week 7 Lucero Hernandez Cruz A04

From Tuesday’s recap lecture about Neoliberalism, we see an entire system that is on the rise within America that keeps getting stronger with the aid of the new immigration laws currently being enforced by our president. Furthermore, these private companies with their constant funding for different government officials hold a tie on the government that allows laws to sway in their favor. The privatization of prisons allows these private industries and CEO’s of said companies to profit from our recent laws that have made immigration illegal. One important aspect and perspective that I had not looked at was through the lenses of immigration not being illegal because they are residing in another country without proper identification; rather, they criminalize certain aspects of the immigrant like obtaining a job and proper identification which are essential to living in the United States. By criminalizing their actions they impede for immigrants to have access to a better lifestyle because they are unable to work legally making it challenging not only for them to get a job but a better paying one. This further allows the system to racialized minorities and further create a division between the “native” and the “non-native”. Furthermore, the private prisons are presented in a way as a relief for the state prisons since they are able to “accommodate ” more inmates. The simple idea that they classify immigrants as inmates to me is absurd because many people close to me and from other cases I’ve heard immigrated to the United States because they wanted to provide for their families residing back in their home country or with them in the United States.

Question

What is the process private prisons have in making certain laws favor them for their financial gains? How can we connect immigrants to the citizens to encourage laws that go against the privatization of prisons?

References

Ackerman, R.A., Furman, R. (2012) The criminalization of immigration and the privatization of the immigration detention: Implications for justice. Contemporary Justice Review. Retrieved from https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10282580.2013.798506

Gomez, S. (2012. The business of Private Prisons in the US. Argenpress.Retrieved from http://watchingamerica.com/WA/2012/07/20/the-business-of-private-prisons-in-the-us/[image]