Gadi SchwartzVerified account

The communication director for @southwestkey - the organization that runs the facility just came out, taking issue with the word “detention” and telling us not to show the sign. I asked her what we should we call it given that minors here are not allowed to leave.

She said it was a shelter & kids didn’t want to leave cause they were safe. I asked her how we could know if we weren’t allowed to speak to kids. She said all we would do is exploit them. I asked about fences & she literally said they were to protect children from people like us.

That being said. A couple things. The majority of the clinical/instructional staff at @SouthwestKey seem to be earnest people who are trying to help, teach and protect children. A clinician said their number one priority was to reunite kids with their family and I believed him.

The other thing the comm director took offense to was that we weren’t putting enough focus on the fact that the majority of the kids here crossed the border without parents and are technically “unaccompanied minors” and that’s a valid point.

So far only about 10% at this shelter have been seperated from family by the govt under the administrations new zero tolerance policy. Nationwide out of the 11,351 kids who are being detained or “sheltered” or whatever they call it... about 2000 r family separations

Those numbers are from the last 6 weeks. About 1600 more beds are have just been ordered and tent facilities like the one @jacobsoboroff reported on are being are being planned in anticipation for more detentions.... and more “clients” as they are referred to as some staff.