Grant Will Support Work of CREEC’s Immigration Detention Accountability Project (IDAP)
The Ford Foundation has awarded CREEC a $150,000 grant, distributed over a two-year time period to support IDAP’s work. Established in 2018 CREEC’s Immigration Detention Accountability Project (IDAP) believes that current immigration detention practices are inherently constitutionally suspect and inappropriate for the vast majority of non-citizens awaiting resolution of their immigration status. As long as detention continues to be sanctioned by the courts and Congress, IDAP will fight to ensure that people in ICE custody are held in constitutionally adequate conditions, receive constitutionally adequate medical and mental health care, and are not discriminated against on the basis of disability. Recent IDAP work toward this end includes filing a systemic class action lawsuit, Fraihat v. ICE – challenging ICE’s failure to ensure adequate conditions related to medical, mental health, and disability; successfully challenging conditions at a federal prison in Victorville, CA; representation of individual detained immigrants; providing assistance to other immigration advocates through presentations, workshops, and educational materials on the rights of detained immigrants with disabilities.
Elizabeth Jordan, Director of the Immigration Detention Accountability Project, states, “The generous grant we received from the Ford Foundation will help IDAP maximize our impact by reaching as many people in ICE’s jails and prisons with medical, mental health, and disability needs as possible. We are grateful to the Ford Foundation for their support of CREEC while we fight to ensure that the civil and human rights of all people are met.”
The Ford Foundation invests in institutions, ideas, and individuals to fight the drivers of inequality in our society. Identifying seven interconnected areas – Civic Engagement and Government, Creativity and Free Expression, Future of Work(ers), Gender, Racial, and Ethnic Justice, Just Cities and Regions, Natural Resources and Climate Change, Technology and Society – the Ford Foundation offers grants in each with the belief that these combined efforts will effectively challenge inequality.