Pontius Mead and the Immigrant Prison

According to the Sagebrush Gospel translation of Matthew 27:24, “When Pontius Mead saw that he was about to leave office and hoping to go quietly, but that instead an uproar was starting over whether a private corporation with a track record of human rights abuses could build an immigrant prison in Evanston, he took water and washed his hands in front of the crowd and said, “It is not my responsibility. I am but a lame duck governor.”

A for-profit corporation wants to build a prison in Evanston housing 600 people charged with, not convicted of, being here illegally, which is not a crime. Management and Training Corporation (MTC) has, according to the Casper Star Tribune, left a “trail of lawsuits in its wake” in several states including Wyoming, and has a “troubled history.”

Wyoming has a law to protect communities from hucksters like this. The legislature didn’t want seat-of-the-pants companies coming here and opening up private prisons free of oversight.

Wyoming Statute 7-22-102 is clear. If a private corporation wants to build a “jail, prison, or other incarceration facility,” the five state elected officials must consent. Until they consent, the Uinta County Commissioners may not contract with MTC. The statute provides standards the facility must meet, standards which MTC has been unable to meet in some of their other facilities.

Washing his hands of the controversy, Governor Mead says the Evanston facility is not a prison and therefore does not require the consent of the five elected officials. So, why haven’t we heard from the other four?

Perhaps all five need a tutorial on the definition of a “jail, prison, or other incarceration facility.” It’s not that hard. The definition is obvious enough the legislature didn’t feel it necessary to be pedantic enough to spell it out in any greater depth.

You don’t need to go to law school to know a jail is a place of confinement for people who are awaiting trial. The jail exists to make sure the people confined there do not come and go as they please. The guards are trained and armed to make sure that doesn’t happen. They are aided by a construction design that includes walls, razor wire, and technology to keep them inside.

That is exactly what MTC and ICE are planning to build and Mr. Mead it is a jail.

For purposes of making life easier for MTC, the Governor cannot simply redefine the term “jail” in order to skirt the statute. Why would he want to with so much at stake? Why have the other four elected officials remained mum?

Didn’t we learn anything from Heart Mountain? Opening the state to a questionable company and allowing it to jail as many as 600 persons in a facility regulated only by the county commissioners in Uinta County is begging for another stain on the state’s image.

MTC’s record should have raised concerns in the minds of the county commissioners but this corporation eats local government politicians for lunch. Dangle a few jobs in the face of locally elected pols and they begin salivating. Then they overlook the red flags and warnings. Neither do they have enough vision to ask themselves what will happen when Trump is no longer president and a new policy on immigration doesn’t rely on rounding up and locking up people. What happens when MTC does here what they have done elsewhere and the level of human rights abuses behind the walls reaches the public. Who then will take responsibility. It won’t be the county commissioners.

Apparently, our Governor wants to make sure it isn’t him either. But what about the other elected officials? Are they as willing to ignore this issue?

Ed Buchanan wants to continue as Secretary of State. State Treasurer Mark Gordon wants the Governorship. Jillian Balow wants a second term as Superintendent of Public Instruction. A lot of voters want them to take responsibility.

They may think it politically prudent to wash their hands alongside Mead, but when this whole thing blows up, as it will, it’ll happen under their watch and Mead will be gone.