U.S. will place immigrants under house arrest as an alternative to detention

The Biden Administration seeks to place hundreds of migrants detained at the border on house arrests as a cheaper alternative to detention, according to a U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) official. 

A pilot program dubbed “Home Curfew” will be launched in Houston and Baltimore for 120 days to test the idea. The pilot will place 100 to 200 adults under house arrest in each location, reported Reuters. 

Immigrants enrolled in the program will have to remain at home every day from 8 p.m. to 8 a.m. Exceptions will be made who have work authorizations or have a permit.

The Home Curfew pilot will have a daily cost of $6-8 per individual in the program, less than the $142 per person cost of immigration detention. 

Current alternatives to detention include ankle bracelets and phone monitoring. Immigrants in these programs are required to notify managers if they are traveling but do not mandate home confinement, said the DHS official. 

The pilot program comes at a time when a record number of undocumented immigrants are crossing the U.S. border, and detention centers have limited space due to the Covid-19 pandemic. 

"We just don't have the capacity," the DHS official said. "We're not going to detain our way out of the border crisis."

During his campaign, President Joe Biden pledged to end for-profit detention centers. Biden plans to push for congressional funding that would place over 400.000 migrants in alternative programs to detention.