The battle to shut down a Pennsylvania detention center hasn t ended, despite the federal government s recent release of eight asylum-seeking families, including 15 children.
The Berks Family Detention Center is one of only three facilities in the United States that holds both children and their parents who have entered this country as political refugees, seeking the protection of the U.S. government. They remain there to await their hearings with an immigration judge.
Some of those children have spent months in the Berks County facility.
The federal government doesn t call it a prison; social justice groups do. They can’t leave, and if they do try to leave, they will be in trouble. That is a prison, said Jasmine Rivera, one of the co-founders of Shut Down Berks Coalition, an organization that has been fighting for the center s closure for four years.
Berks Family Detention Center releases families and kids, remains open poconorecord.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from poconorecord.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.