The Trump administration is holding dozens of foreigners from 26 different countries at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, as President Donald Trump presses ahead with dispatching the notorious military prison in his immigration crackdown.
Seventy-two immigration detainees—hailing from every continent except Antarctica—are being held at Guantanamo, in addition to about a dozen prisoners from the war on terror housed in a separate section.
The immigration detainees are nationals of countries including Brazil, China, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, India, Jamaica, Kenya, Liberia, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Myanmar, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Peru, Romania, Russia, Somalia, St. Kitts-Nevis, the United Kingdom, Venezuela and Vietnam, according to CBS News.
Before the new detainees were transferred to the facility, it had primarily housed Spanish-speaking detainees from Latin America.
According to two U.S. officials who spoke to CBS News, 58 of the detainees have been labeled “high-risk.” They are being held at Camp IV, which also holds about a dozen war-on-terror-era prisoners, albeit in a distinct area.
The remaining 14 immigration detainees are being held in a part of the prison called the Migrant Operations Center and have been classified “low-risk,” meaning they have no serious criminal record or none at all.
Trump in January vowed only to detain “the worst criminal illegal aliens threatening the American people” at Guantanamo, but his administration in March gave way for non-criminals to be held there as well.
The 72 detainees, however, fall well short of Trump’s stated goal of locking up 30,000 migrants at the facility.
Critics have condemned the administration’s use of the facility—which has long held war-on-terror detainees, some of whom were found to have faced abuse and torture—arguing that it blurs the line between civil and criminal detention. By law, immigration detention falls under the civil system, not the criminal one.
The cost of transferring migrants to the base has also drawn backlash. Between January and April, only about 500 migrants passed through the facility, yet the administration spent at least $21 million on transporting them to the island on military aircraft.
Guantanamo sits on Cuban land that the U.S. claims to lease, though the Cuban government has long refused U.S. payments and has repeatedly demanded the base’s return.
DHS officials provided criminal records for some of the detainees, detailing convictions that include homicide, sexual offenses, child pornography, assault with a weapon, and drug smuggling.
“Whether it is CECOT, Alligator Alcatraz, Guantanamo Bay or another detention facility, these dangerous criminals will not be allowed to terrorize U.S. citizens,” DHS assistant secretary for public affairs Tricia McLaughlin told CBS News, referring to the Salvadoran mega-prison where the administration mistakenly sent Kilmar Abrego Garcia, as well as the facility recently established in Florida’s Everglades.
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