Recent news reports have indicated that the Lamont administration may be considering housing children who arrive unaccompanied in the United States in the former Connecticut Juvenile Training School, a former youth prison that closed in 2018. The following is a reaction from David McGuire, executive director of the ACLU of Connecticut:
“Immigrant children should be able to pursue their asylum claims from safe environments in the U.S. where they are cared for, protected from deportation, and able to begin healing from the trauma and hardships they have often endured. Children do not belong in cages, and the fact that the state is considering placing immigrant children in a former youth prison is disturbing. Prisons, once closed, should be demolished to prevent them from ever being resurrected, including for use against children who are coming to the United States.”
