The US held migrants at Guantanamo before. Is Trump’s approach different?

The Donald Trump medication has started sending flights of undocumented migrants successful the United States to Guantanamo Bay. The officials successful complaint person painted the determination arsenic a communal practice, saying Guantanamo Bay has ever been utilized for migration enforcement.

“We’ll person the capableness to proceed to bash determination what we’ve ever done. We’ve ever had a beingness of amerciable immigrants determination that person been detained. We’re conscionable gathering retired immoderate capacity,” Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem said connected February 2 connected NBC’s Meet the Press.

Noem made a akin assertion February 9 connected CNN’s State of the Union, 2 days aft visiting the Guantanamo Bay facility.

The US has so antecedently utilized a Guantanamo Bay campy to detain definite migrants, but Trump’s usage is different, migration experts person said.

On January 29, Trump signed a memo directing the departments of defence and homeland information to grow the Migrant Operations Centre astatine Guantanamo Bay to “provide further detention abstraction for high-priority transgression aliens unlawfully contiguous successful the United States”.

The medication has provided conflicting accusation astir wherever migrants volition beryllium held wrong Guantanamo Bay, for however agelong and nether what conditions.

Based connected disposable information, determination are cardinal differences betwixt the naval centre’s erstwhile migration operations and the Trump administration’s approach:

• Historically, the US has utilized Guantanamo Bay to clasp migrants stopped astatine sea. Now, Trump is sending radical who were detained connected US soil.
• Previously, migrants were held astatine the Migrant Operations Center, a antithetic portion of the basal from the prisons wherever suspects accused of “terrorism” are detained. The archetypal radical of migrants that arrived astatine Guantanamo Bay nether Trump are detained successful the prisons wherever specified suspects were held.
• In caller years, the Migrant Operations Center has held fewer migrants and had constricted capacity. Trump says helium plans to detain 30,000 people. That galore radical haven’t been detained astatine Guantanamo Bay since the 1990s.

When the US held Haitians and Cubans astatine Guantanamo Bay

The Guantanamo Bay naval basal is amended known arsenic a high-security situation for overseas “terrorism” suspects pursuing the September 11, 2001, attacks. But astir a decennary before, the US utilized a conception of it arsenic a migrant detention centre.

In the aboriginal 1990s, the US Coast Guard held Haitians and Cubans intercepted astatine oversea astatine Guantanamo Bay. In September 1994, 12,000 Haitians and 33,000 Cubans were held successful Guantanamo Bay’s Migrant Operations Center, the Congressional Research Service found. People were held successful tent-like structures surrounded by razor wire.

Scores of Haitian refugees basal down razor ligament astatine the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base successful Cuba connected December 29, 1991. The men were rescued successful planetary waters by the United States Coast Guard aft fleeing economical hardship successful Haiti [File: Bebeto Matthews/AP Photo]

People held successful Guantanamo Bay did not person entree to lawyers to assistance them use for asylum, Yale instrumentality prof Harold Koh told PBS News successful 2017. Koh sued the US authorities implicit its attraction of Haitians successful Guantanamo Bay.

Some Haitians and Cubans were allowed to use for asylum; fewer got it. Many Haitians whom the authorities determined could use for asylum were barred from entering the US to use due to the fact that they were HIV-positive, the National Immigrant Justice Center, an migrant advocacy organisation, wrote successful a 2021 report.

The migrant campy closed successful 1996. But that wasn’t the past clip migrants were held successful Guantanamo Bay.

How the signifier was restarted

The Guantanamo Migrant Operations Center, which is abstracted from the detention centre wherever coercion suspects are kept, tin clasp astir 130 people, according to the Global Detention Project, an planetary radical that documents migration detention worldwide.

The Department of Homeland Security did not reply PolitiFact’s query astir however galore migrants were astatine Guantanamo Bay earlier Trump’s order. But successful September 2024, The New York Times reported the centre had held 37 radical from 2020 to 2023, and 4 radical arsenic of February 2024. People detained determination were intercepted astatine oversea by the US Coast Guard.

People intercepted astatine oversea and sent to Guantanamo don’t person the enactment to question asylum successful the US, the International Refugee Assistance Project said successful a September 2024 report. Instead, they indispensable take betwixt returning to the state they’re fleeing oregon waiting successful Guantanamo Bay for a 3rd state to judge them.

Migrants astatine Guantanamo Bay deficiency “access to basal quality necessities, due aesculapian care, education, and potable water,” the exile task said successful its report. Migrants don’t person entree to unmonitored calls with lawyers and can’t candidly talk astir mediocre conditions astatine the naval base, the study said.

How agelong radical person been held successful Guantanamo Bay varies. The New York Times reported successful 2024 that families person been determination for much than six months. But successful 1 case, idiosyncratic was held for astir 4 years.

What’s antithetic astir the Trump administration’s approach?

Trump’s unprecedented proposal raises ineligible questions.

The US has ne'er sent radical who were arrested oregon detained successful the United States to Guantanamo, the Council connected Foreign Relations, a nonpartisan overseas argumentation deliberation tank, wrote connected February 4.

Under national law, radical successful the US accused of civilian migration violations person much rights than radical intercepted astatine sea, Hannah Flamm, interim elder argumentation manager astatine the International Refugee Assistance Project, said.

People who person been connected US ungraded “have rights and protections, adjacent if they are sent to Guantanamo. Whether these rights volition beryllium respected is different question,” she said.

It’s not wide however owed process for migrants volition beryllium followed, arsenic Noem assured.

“The US authorities intentionally uses Guantanamo successful hopes of avoiding oversight and the nationalist eye, which makes the installation ripe for abuse,” Flamm said.

The American Civil Liberties Union wrote the Trump medication a missive connected February 7 requesting entree to the migrants who person been sent to Guantanamo Bay truthful they person “access to ineligible counsel, and truthful advocates and the nationalist tin recognize the conditions nether which the authorities is detaining them”.

In her February 9 CNN interview, Noem said she and Trump were “comfortable” that it is ineligible to bring migrants who were already connected US ungraded to the island.

It’s unclear however agelong the migrants volition beryllium astatine Guantanamo Bay nether Trump’s plan.

Noem and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth person said migrants’ detention astatine Guantanamo Bay volition beryllium impermanent portion they await deportation. On CNN, Noem said, “My extremity is that radical are not successful these facilities for weeks and months,” though she wouldn’t regularisation retired longer stays if different countries don’t judge them.

On January 29, Trump said helium intends that Guantanamo Bay clasp “the worst transgression amerciable aliens threatening the American people. Some of them are truthful atrocious we don’t adjacent spot their countries to clasp them due to the fact that we don’t privation them coming back.”

It’s unclear what volition hap if the authorities tries to detain migrants sent to Guantanamo Bay indefinitely.

People cannot beryllium indefinitely held successful migration detention successful the US, the US Supreme Court ruled in 2001. So immigrants who cannot beryllium deported due to the fact that their location countries won’t judge deportation flights are mostly released.

Another displacement from the previous usage of Guantanamo Bay for migration detention is the determination wherever migrants volition beryllium held nether Trump’s administration.

Hegseth said migrants sent to Guantanamo Bay would beryllium detained separately from the campy wherever coercion suspects are kept. He said they would beryllium detained successful the Migrant Operations Center.

The 10 migrants connected the archetypal formation from the US to Guantanamo Bay were placed successful 1 of the detention centres wherever coercion suspects were antecedently held, not successful the Migrant Operations Center. The gathering the migrants are successful is not the aforesaid gathering wherever the remaining 15 wartime detainees are held, the Defense Department said.

Wartime detainees person been held successful Guantanamo Bay for decades.