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Faced with mounting congressional criticism, the chief of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Friday defended how her agency treats illegal immigrants being held in detention facilities across the country and said lawmakers should see for themselves what the conditions are like.

ICE Administrator Julie Myers said that one of her highest priorities since taking over the agency just over two years ago has been improving conditions at detention facilities.

"My goal is to make sure absolutely everybody in our custody is cared for with the highest standards," she said.

The agency, part of the Homeland Security Department, and its detention operations have come under congressional fire in response to news reports citing poor care, including a CBS "60 Minutes" story and a four-part series in the Washington Post.

Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn., announced last week he will introduce legislation aimed at ensuring the humane treatment of asylum seekers and other detained immigrants. House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., and Judiciary Immigration Subcommittee Chairman Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., sent Homeland Security Secretary Chertoff a letter May 15 demanding answers about the medical treatment provided to detainees.

"The Department of Homeland Security's disregard for detainee health is simply unacceptable," Conyers wrote. "Letting someone live or die as fate will allow is not just bad medicine; it is inhumane."

On Wednesday, Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., said he was joining forces with Conyers and Lofgren to support legislation that would require Homeland Security to provide timely and effective basic medical care to all detainees and report all detainee deaths to the department's inspector general and Congress.

Myers said she is reviewing the legislation but said the administration has not taken a position. She said some proposed legislative changes have been made by ICE, such as reporting deaths to the inspector general. She said she hopes lawmakers will conduct their own look into ICE detention operations and tour the facilities. For example, she said deaths of detainees have dropped from 29 in 2004 to seven in 2007 while the number of detained immigrants has increased. She added there has not been a suicide in 15 months.

Myers said ICE is continually looking for ways to improve detainee treatment and that she has asked the department's Office of Health Affairs for recommendations. She said the agency wants to create more electronic medical records for detainees. On a related front, Myers said ICE is facing a surge of illegal immigrants coming from U.S. jails who must be detained while they await deportation. She said the agency will accept about 200,000 illegal immigrants from jails this year, compared to about 65,000 in 2006. But overall, Myers estimates that U.S. jails house about 500,000 illegal immigrants who have committed serious crimes.

"I anticipate that next year's number will be higher than 200,000," she said.

COMMENTS

• Frank - don't know where you come from, but in my eyes breaking into my country ILLEGALLY is a serious crime, just as serious as someone breaking into my house! And the last thing we need is a guest worker program. You don't seriously believe that these "guests" would leave when the party is over? Marie Posted May 29, 2008 7:37 AM
• Come to south Texas and you'll see how many illegal immigrants DON"T maintain vehicle insurance or even current vehicle registrations, bleed the public assistance programs dry and then send all of that money back to their home countries. Bartonium Posted May 28, 2008 10:35 PM
• Are these undocumented workers really being held for "serious" crimes? Some are, no doubt. But when a kosher slaughterhouse is raided in Iowa, and hundreds of workers are rounded up (with hundreds more being sought), the problem is mostly that they used bogus documents. They did their work. They were paid a decent living. The paid their rent. They bought and insured vehicles. They contributed to their community. Then, when they tried to unionize, Homeland Security suddenly stepped in. Was that a coincidence? Fat chance. If we had a reasonable guest worker program, they wouldn't have needed to use bogus documents to work. If Clinton and the Republicans hadn't passed NAFTA, they would still have a viable economy in Mexico to support their familes. The government has criminalized an entire class of decent hardworking people who are struggling to survive, labelled them "serious criminals" and thrown them into federal prisons where the pressure to join gangs of really bad guys, narcotrafficers from Texas and Mexico, is immense. Like the Iraq tragedy, this is really a case of "blowback," largely avoidable if we had a rational president and administration. Frank Smith Posted May 28, 2008 9:31 AM