Families decry conditions inside immigrant detention centers
June 28 (UPI) -- Friends and family members of people detained in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids are raising concerns over conditions inside detention centers in California.
One family member reported not being able to meet with his father who is being held at the federal Metropolitan Detention Center in downtown Los Angeles and instead having to leave blood pressure medication for him, CBS News reported.
CBS also quoted one immigration lawyer who collectively referred to the Los Angeles facility and others in California being used to detain thousands of people as a "ticking time bomb."
Other family members report similar conditions faced by detainees.
"She's saying that she's not being fed, that she's sleeping on a concrete floor and that her and a couple of people have to huddle in order to keep warm," Zulma Zapeta told KTLA in an interview about her mother.
Zapeta's 41-year-old mother Guadalupe Gutierrez, has been detained at the Adelanto ICE Processing Center in San Bernardino County, Calif.
Zapeta claims she has not been able to provide necessary medication to Gutierrez, who has been in the United States for over two decades and does not have a criminal record.
Civil rights attorney Sergio Perez called the situation inside several of the state's federal detention centers "cruel and inhumane," in an interview with KABC-TV.
"I saw people waiting for hours, elderly women and men without chairs in a concrete hallway infested with flies, and not receiving any information as to how long it was going to take to view their loved ones," Perez, executive director for the Center for Human Rights and Constitutional Law, said in the interview.
"This year alone, the number of children held for two weeks or longer, as this child and their family was, has increased sevenfold," the center said on Facebook. "Border Patrol runs some of the harshest and cruelest prisons that will never be safe for children -- making every day spent there dangerous."
Officials are currently holding around 59,000 immigrants in federal detention centers across the country, CBS News reported this week, citing internal government data.
That puts the number of detainees being held at 140% capacity, compared to the 41,500-person figure passed by Congress.
Earlier this month, the city of Glendale, Calif., said it was terminating contracts with the Department of Homeland Security and ICE to house federal detainees at local police stations, calling the issue too "divisive."
Private prison firm CoreCivic confirmed earlier in the month that it reached a deal with DHS and ICE to convert one of its facilities to house federal detainees. The Nashville-based company is converting its existing detention facility located in California City, in Kern County, Calif. The detention center currently has 2,560 beds for inmates.
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USA Today
21 minutes ago
- USA Today
The businesses that are, and aren't, shifting production under Trump's tariffs
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Meanwhile, many U.S. manufacturers that rely on imports may be more likely to pass on tariff costs to consumers than reshore their supply chains. Nearly one-third of U.S. manufacturers' intermediate inputs are imported from other countries, according to a 2022 report from the Commerce Department. 'In the short run, it's going to hurt manufacturers. It's going to hurt the factory owners. It's going to hurt the workers,' said Nancy Qian, an economics professor at Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management. 'And that's on top of the pain the workers will feel when they go to the store and need to pay more for their imported (items).' Why shifting to US suppliers isn't always an easy solution Trump's tariffs are meant to position the U.S. as a 'global superpower in manufacturing' by drawing in new factories and manufacturing investments. 'The president has said early and often that the best way to avoid tariffs is to just come here and produce," Trump's top trade adviser, Peter Navarro, told CNBC in early April. 'We're going to get to a place where America makes stuff again.' But moving supply chains to the U.S. can be costly. Nearly two-thirds of 380 surveyed companies say building a new domestic supply chain would at least double their current costs, according to an April CNBC survey. Sixty-one percent said it would be more cost-effective to relocate to a lower-tariffed country. 'If the U.S. continues its focus on China, it will be successful in moving production out of China to some extent, but it won't move so much of it back to the U.S.,' Qian said. 'There are many other countries out there that can manufacture at costs lower than the U.S.' Even if tariffs boost U.S. manufacturing, it'll take years for new factories to get up and running. That could leave U.S. companies searching for domestic suppliers struggling in the meantime. Take 000Skin, a beauty company launched by Hannah Chang earlier this year. While 000Skin is based in New York, Chang has been sourcing the containers for her skin care products in China, where she says manufacturing capabilities are unmatched. 'I think people are not aware how much work and infrastructure even creating a plastic jar takes,' Chang said. But rising import costs from tariffs have thrown her for a loop. Chang has looked for alternative suppliers in the U.S., but says she has yet to find options that match the quality and price of what Chinese manufacturers can supply. She's considered shifting to a Mexican producer, but said it's been difficult finding one willing to work with smaller businesses. 'I'll probably just continue to look at China-based partners,' Chang said, adding that she's considering raising prices to cover at least some of the 30% tariff rate. Courtney Rivenbark looked into working with U.S. manufacturers when she created her apparel and jewelry brand, Coco Clem, in 2018. The high production costs turned her away, and she eventually pivoted to a partnership with a Chinese factory she said aligned with her ethical and environmental goals. 'China is just very advanced with their machines and equipment and technology,' Rivenbark said. 'The whole supply chain exists in China – the knits, the yard, the GOTS (Global Organic Textile Standard) certified organic cotton yarn.' After Trump announced new tariffs earlier this year, Rivenbark said she compared pricing from China with U.S. manufacturers. She said it would cost her three times more to create the same sweater in the U.S., and local manufacturers didn't have the technology to create certain garments in plus sizes. 'I would move (production to the U.S.) if the infrastructure was here,' Rivenbark said. But 'it's just so much more expensive. ... I'm not really interested in moving it outside of China because of a potential short-term policy switch.' How many factories, jobs are coming to the US? That's not to say tariffs aren't pressuring some businesses to increase their investments in the U.S. Whether those moves will lead to a dramatic influx of manufacturing jobs is another question. Cra-Z-Art – a New Jersey-based manufacturer that produces toys, activities and school supplies – in March announced plans to grow production space by 50% to 1.5 million square feet to combat the cost of tariffs. Lawrence Rosen, chairman of Cra-Z-Art, said it's too early to say how many jobs the move will create, but the company is looking to use automation 'wherever possible' to reduce direct labor costs. 'I need to control my 102-year-old company's destiny by controlling its future and not relying on global tariffs when things could change daily,' Lawrence said. 'By manufacturing in the USA, we save on freight, we save with automation. ... 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And a spokesperson for German medical technology company Siemens Healthineers, another company listed on the website, told USA TODAY that several of the initiatives included in its $150 million investment in new and expanded U.S. facilities have been underway for 'well over a year," although projects were accelerated to address rising economic and geopolitical uncertainty. Michael Strain, director of economic policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank, doesn't expect to see much reshoring tied to tariffs. 'For a business to set up a factory in the United States, that's a 10-year investment or longer,' Strain said. 'How can a business possibly know whether or not that would be profitable if tariff rates are changing every week?" Some data suggests the domestic manufacturing industry has actually taken a hit from tariffs, with trade policy uncertainty prompting some companies to tighten their purse strings. Economic activity in the manufacturing sector contracted in May for the third consecutive month to reach its lowest level since November, with both orders and output contracting, according to a survey by the Institute for Supply Management. Meanwhile, the manufacturing sector lost about 8,000 jobs between April and May despite an overall increase in employment, according to the Labor Department. Susan Helper, an economics professor at Case Western Reserve University in Ohio who served on the White House staff in both the Obama and Biden Administrations, believes tariffs can be a useful tool, but the uncertainty surrounding trade policy has been 'a real problem.' "I think what companies are doing is just not investing anywhere in anything and just waiting to see how things shake out,' she said.
USA Today
21 minutes ago
- USA Today
Tariffs are meant to boost US manufacturing. Is America ready?
Winton Machine, an Atlanta-based manufacturer, is desperate to hire. So far, there are few takers. CEO and co-founder Lisa Winton has been searching for a salesperson since March. A mechanist job has been open even longer, with less than a dozen applications over the past year – none of whom had the skillset required for the job. Winton has done what she can to attract workers, like forming a relationship with local technical colleges, offering applicants flexible hours and rehiring retirees. Still, keeping her staffing up has been a challenge. The push for more domestic manufacturing through tariffs, Winton worries, will only make matters worse. 'If more factories move into an area, who are they competing with? They're competing with other factories," she said. "Whether it be machinists or maintenance or assembly, all of the different types of jobs that are available – they have to come from somewhere.' President Donald Trump has said his tariffs, which range from a 10% baseline tariff on trade partners to 50% on steel imports, will have jobs and factories 'come roaring back.' 'The end game is to have production here. Any country that wants to produce here doesn't pay a tariff. That's the ultimate solution,' Trump's top trade adviser, Peter Navarro, told ABC News in early April. It's not clear that America is prepared for that shift. Building new manufacturing facilities can take up to 10 years, depending on the industry, and experts say the country's infrastructure isn't primed to handle additional factories. Meanwhile, a manufacturing labor shortage could mean new factories have a hard time filling roles. 'If the Trump administration's vision is to bring manufacturing back to America en masse – not just in a few sectors, but en masse – that vision isn't realistic," said Nancy Qian, an economics professor at Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management. Why building factories will take time It's not clear how many businesses will shift production to the U.S. because of tariffs. Those that do reshore face a lengthy process. 'Most companies do not make a decision to onshore or to build a new factory or plant lightly,' said Erin McLaughlin, a senior economist at the Conference Board, a nonprofit business-research group. 'This is something for most companies that they strategize many years in advance.' First, companies must figure out where to build. The location needs to be close to transportation corridors, good water supplies and on a stable electric grid – something easier said than done with current U.S. infrastructure, which earned a C in its 2025 report card from the American Society of Civil Engineers, according to McLaughlin. Then, companies must purchase the land, obtain proper permits and inspections, design their factory, purchase equipment and select a construction team. Only then can they start construction. The process generally takes three to 10 years, depending on the industry, McLaughlin said. Certain projects can be done in less time, although the timeline can be challenged by growing competition for sites with access to a stable electric grid, according to Jeff Bischoff, chief sales officer at Lexington, Kentucky-based designer-builder Gray. 'Power generation is not keeping up right now with demand,' Bischoff said. 'All the utilities are doing their best to try to keep up and get ahead of that. But it's a several-year process.' Trump has acknowledged that infrastructure changes will be necessary, and believes it would take roughly two years to get his vision for manufacturing up and running. 'You've got to build a thing called a factory. You have to build your energy. You have to do a lot of things,' Trump said on April 7, adding that he would give businesses approvals for electric plants in 'record timing.' But McLaughlin believes a two-year turnaround for bolstering the U.S. manufacturing sector could be optimistic. Even if executive orders speed up federal approvals, she said, factories would likely still need to worry about state and local permits. More complications could arise if the Trump administration continues to crack down on immigration, with roughly 20% of manufacturing workers in the U.S. foreign-born, according to labor market analytics firm Lightcast. An even higher share – roughly 30% – are foreign-born in construction. "We don't want to be over reliant on one trading partner for certain things,' McLaughlin said. But 'I don't think the U.S. is prepped and primed for everything to be manufactured here.' Are tariffs worth the pain? Trump says the ultimate fruits of tariffs will be worth the pain. Experts disagree. Why manufacturers are struggling to hire Trump's push for more factories comes after a dramatic decline in manufacturing jobs. After accounting for roughly 22% of total nonfarm employment in 1979, manufacturing work makes up just 8% today. Even if tariffs were able to eliminate the entire U.S. trade deficit in manufacturing, that would still only bump that share up to about 10% of employment – still less than half of its share in the late 1970s, according to Robert Lawrence, a Harvard professor of international trade and investment and author of 'Behind the Curve: Can Manufacturing Still Provide Inclusive Growth?' 'Even in its most successful form, this is barely noticeable,' Lawrence said. Other experts warn that even that level of growth could exacerbate the hiring challenges manufacturers face today. Manufacturers have been struggling to fill jobs for years, including during a post-pandemic construction boom, when supply chain issues pushed more manufacturers to build facilities closer to home. The number of manufacturing establishments in the U.S. increased by more than 11% between the first quarter of 2019 and the second quarter of 2023, according to a 2024 report from Deloitte. Despite the growth, manufacturing jobs have remained essentially flat since 2019, discounting a pandemic-era dip. That's partially due to automation; factories today need fewer workers. But nearly half of manufacturers say attracting and retaining talent has been a major challenge, according to a first-quarter survey from the National Association of Manufacturers. Bureau of Labor Statistics data shows there were 381,000 manufacturing job openings as of April. By 2033, manufacturing could have 1.9 million unfilled jobs – roughly half of open positions – due to a skills and applicant gap, according to Deloitte. 'We absolutely do not have enough people ready to take these jobs,' said Rachel Sederberg, senior economist at Lightcast. 'That is going to be a very significant challenge if more and more manufacturing – or more and more of anything – comes back to the U.S.' One issue is that manufacturing workers are aging out of the workforce. Just over one-third of manufacturing employees in the U.S. are 55 or older and nearing retirement, according to a recent report from Lightcast, which is expected to make the shortage even more acute. And attracting new talent to backfill these positions hasn't been easy. As factories turn to more automation, manufacturers say they're having trouble finding talent with the right skillset to manage the more advanced technology. 'Not every manufacturing job today requires a degree, but every single manufacturing job today requires skills,' said Carolyn Lee, executive director of the Manufacturing Institute, a nonprofit focused on workforce development and education within the industry. Lee said obtaining those skills can take anywhere from a day or two for a forklift certification to up to four years of education and apprenticeship programs for maintenance technicians, one of the most in-demand manufacturing jobs today. There are some signs of renewed interest in trade jobs. Enrollment in public two-year institutions that focus on vocational programs was up 14% year-over-year in 2024, outpacing the 3% growth in public four-year schools, according to a May 12 Wells Fargo report. But Lightcast found there are still not enough students learning relevant skills to keep up with job demand. For instance, there were just 400 machinist program completions in Texas in 2023 compared to roughly 16,000 related job openings in the state. Research suggests manufacturing's reputation as dirty and dangerous has made the industry less appealing to younger Americans, especially amid a period of low unemployment. The Deloitte report says 'a different set of expectations' among millennial and Generation Z workers, many of whom were pushed to go to college instead of working in the trades, has made it difficult for manufacturers to attract and retain workers. 'The consensus among American manufacturers is this generation of Americans just don't want these jobs anymore," said Qian of Northwestern. Fear of lower wages may also be keeping workers away. Manufacturing work today can pay well, and some research finds it tends to pay better than other sectors that don't require college degrees. But as of 2018, the average hourly earnings for manufacturing employees fall short of average overall employee earnings, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. What kind of jobs would more manufacturing create? There's a reason so many American companies rely on factories abroad; operating in the U.S. tends to be more expensive. For one, labor costs are higher. Take the average annual machine operator salary, which is nearly $45,000 in the U.S. compared to $15,000 in China and less than $5,000 in Vietnam, according to the Reshoring Institute, a nonprofit that supports expanded U.S. manufacturing. And tariffs are expected to hike production costs for many domestic manufacturers, since companies will need to pay more for inputs shipped in from other countries. That could leave manufacturers increasingly turning toward automation to trim costs. 'If you need to pay anyone you employ as a factory worker an average of $36 an hour with benefits, then you are inclined to hire very few of them and instead buy automated equipment and robots,' said Farok Contractor, a professor at Rutgers' management and global business department. Winton of Winton Machine said she's already seeing an increased demand for automation from her company, which designs and produces factory automation for manufacturers in HVAC, aerospace, construction and other industries. Winton still expects to see jobs created if manufacturing gets a boost through tariffs. She just believes automation will allow fewer, high-quality positions as opposed to a large influx of manual labor. Already, manufacturing is relying on more college-educated workers; nearly 32% of civilian manufacturing workers had at least a bachelor's degree in 2023, up from 22% in 2006, according to a USA TODAY analysis of the Census Bureau's American Community Survey data. 'I need the people to build all the parts and pieces and the engineers to design and the software to build this factory automation,' Winton said. 'I think we have the people. Do we have the skillset? That's the question.'
New York Post
an hour ago
- New York Post
Texas Starbucks customer fumes over ‘illegal' joke that barista wrote on her cup: ‘It's offensive'
A Texas Starbucks customer claims she and her culture were the target of an 'offensive' joke written on the lid of her drink by one of the store's employees. Blanca Lopez, who is Hispanic, ordered a horchata latte during a trip with her two daughters to the Starbucks inside the Irving, Texas Target store on June 23, CBS Texas reported. One of Lopez's daughters noticed their mother's cup had a message scribbled in black marker across the clear lid, an abnormality for a company known for writing customer names on the side of its products. 'What do you call a sick eagle?' the cup asked, according to a photo obtained by the outlet. 'Illegal,' the riddle answered. 7 Blanca Lopez stands outside the Irving, Texas Target where she was handed the offensive joke at the Starbucks location inside the store on June 23, 2025. CBS TEXAS/YouTube Lopez was left in shock by the joke written on her order. 'It's basically saying that we are sick, illegal individuals that do not belong in this country,' she told the outlet. Lopez recalled her confusion when she first saw the message, unsure if the note was a light-hearted joke or an attack on her identity. 'When I read it, I'm like, OK. Was I supposed to laugh or what do I need to do?' she told the outlet. 7 'What do you call a sick eagle?' the cup asked. 'Illegal.' CBS TEXAS/YouTube 7 The Starbucks outlet inside the Target in Irving, Texas. CBS TEXAS/YouTube 'Why did they call me that? Why are they asking if I have papers or no papers? Why did she write this?' she added. 'For me, like, it's offensive.' Lopez said the joke hit close to home as she had friends and relatives deported because they were in the country illegally. In January, 84 illegal immigrants were arrested during an ICE raid in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, according to Fox 4. The outraged customer reported the joke to the store's manager, who told her there would be a team meeting to ensure it didn't happen again, CBS Texas reported. 7 Lopez recalled her confusion when she first saw the message, unsure if the note was a light-hearted joke or an attack at her identity. CBS TEXAS/YouTube 7 Lopez said the joke hit close to home as she had friends and relatives deported because they were in the country illegally. CBS TEXAS/YouTube Lopez called for the unidentified barista to be fired over the comment. 'I work as a manager. If someone on my team did something like that, I would fire her immediately,' she said. Community activists soon heard about the story and began planning a gathering at the store to meet the 'author of the offensive joke,' Dallas-based protester Carlos Quintanilla wrote on Facebook. Quintanilla planned for other protesters to arrive at the shopping center at 10 a.m. on June 28. 7 Carlos Quintanilla speaks out against the message outside the Target on June 27, 2025. CBS TEXAS/YouTube 7 Community activists soon heard about the story and began planning a gathering at the store, to meet the 'author of the offensive joke.' CBS TEXAS/YouTube An hour later, he canceled the gathering after no one showed up. However, he still walked into the Target, livestreaming for his Facebook followers, in search of the Starbucks, but was stopped by a store employee who told him to leave the building because he was recording inside. 'It's not easy to organize our community to raise their voice, I understand that protesting is already very difficult but acting is quite simple. Even Starbucks and Target have responded to our insistence to clarify their position on the offensive 'ILLEGAL' advertisement,' Quintanilla wrote. 'Let's suspend our protest in forgiveness and let's Protest in Silence!' The Post has reached out to Starbucks and Target. Quintanilla defended the illegal immigrants living in his community while outside the store. 'It's not just inappropriate, it's disturbing,' he told CBS Texas. 'Especially right now, when the narrative being thrown out in mass media is if you're illegal, you're a criminal, and if you're a criminal, you're illegal.'
