Immigration protest outside Wells Fargo board member’s house signals new tactic

Immigration advocates descended on a tree-lined residential street in Westfield on Tuesday morning and gathered outside the home of a Wells Fargo board member to protest the bank’s financing of private prisons that house immigration detainees for the federal government. 

Carrying banners, petitions and placards, more than 40 people from Make the Road New Jersey, an immigrant rights organization, arrived on Standish Avenue a little before 7:30 a.m. and began to chant  “Families belong together in communities, not in cages,” and  “Wells Fargo you can’t hide, we can see your dirty side.”  

The action is the first of what one organizer said could be more demonstrations targeting financial institutions that bankroll the private prison operators that help the Trump administration carry out its hard-line approach to immigration enforcement. The administration’s immigration policies have led to a rising number of undocumented immigrants being detained and separated from their children at the border and in communities across the country.   

“Private prison companies hold contracts to operate hundreds of prisons, jails and immigration detention centers across the country and are being used to incarcerate and separate families,” Nedia Morsy, a community organizer who led some of the chants, said as she addressed the protesters. “That’s why we are here today. … Immigrants in your community are being detained and imprisoned in private jails that your bank finances, we demand that you withdraw financing.”

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The demonstrators gathered outside the home of Maria R. Morris, a retired executive vice president of MetLife Inc. who joined the Wells Fargo board in January, according to her LinkedIn profile. She is a member of several of the board’s committees, including those dealing with risk and human resources and regulatory compliance oversight. She also serves on the risk technology subcommittee, according to her profile. 

Morris was not at home Tuesday, according to her husband, Barry Morris, who said she was in San Francisco. He said he took a box of petitions the protesters left behind because he didn’t want them to get wet. He said he would let his wife know about the protest.

Kevin Friedlander, a spokesman for Wells Fargo, said the company respects the seriousness of the country’s ongoing debate about the criminal justice system, and that it encourages people to reach out to elected officials to share their feelings about it.

“However, we do not as a corporation take positions on public policy issues that do not directly affect our company’s ability to serve customers and support team members,” Friedlander said in an email. 

He added that Wells Fargo does not hold any shares in either the GEO Group or CoreCivic Inc., the two private prison companies that the protesters called out at Tuesday’s rally. He said Wells Fargo has no seat on either company’s board of directors, and that the bank does not dictate their policies or business models.

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Some of Morris’ neighbors and their children were awakened by the chants and said the advocates’ tactics so early on a summer day were not appreciated. One shouted to the protesters to “shut up.” 

“This is not the way to get what you want,” said another neighbor who declined to give her name. “It’s way too early. My kids woke me up and asked what is that noise. I just don’t understand the point.” 

Three police cruisers arrived minutes after the protest began and officers stood by for a portion of the gathering, which lasted less than an hour. Three officers spoke briefly with Sara Cullinane, director of Make the Road New Jersey, before they departed.  

Organizers of the rally said that private prison companies, like CoreCivic Inc., which operates the federal immigration detention facility in Elizabeth, rely on investments and debt financing from Wall Street banks, including Wells Fargo, to conduct their day-to-day business operations, finance new facilities and acquire smaller operations.  

A Nov. 2016 report by In the Public Interest, a research and policy center, found that six banks have played large roles in bankrolling CoreCivic and another private prison company, GEO Group. The banks listed were Wells Fargo, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, BNP Paribas, SunTrust and U.S. Bancorp.

The report found that in June 2016, CoreCivic, which was previously known as Corrections Center of America, or CCA,  and GEO Group, had a total of $1.5 billion and $1.94 billion in debt, respectively. 

In exchange, Wall Street banks receive hundreds of millions of dollars in interest and fees each year, according to the report. The private prison companies have also relied on financing from the banks to acquire smaller companies that provide “community corrections” services, like residential re-entry and electronic monitoring, according to the report.

Besides waving signs, the protesters also sang, a few held a clothesline with baby onesies and bibs clipped to it that carried slogans like “Daddy Loves Me” and “My first Christmas.” 

Giovanna Castaneda of Elizabeth, who spoke at the protest, said that her father was detained for three months and later deported. While he was detained, she said, she was unable to reach him. 

“My mother was emotionally and financially disabled,” she recalled. “That’s why I’m here today, Maria Morris.” 

The protesters drew the attention of walkers, joggers, drivers and other neighbors who walked their dogs in the morning. 

One woman, who also declined to give her name as she took her morning walk, said she didn’t understand the issue but thought the action was great. She said she had never seen a protest in the neighborhood in the 10 years she’s lived in the area. 

“I think it’s terrific, I don’t know about the issues so I don’t want to speak on it, but i just think people have the right to dissent,” she said. 

Immigrant detainees held in NJ

There are currently four facilities in New Jersey that house immigration detainees for the federal government. Three of them are publicly owned jails in Bergen, Hudson and Essex counties. Through intergovernmental services agreements with the federal government, the counties get paid for each detainee they house per day. Bergen County, for example, expects to collect $12 million this year to house federal immigration detainees at its jail in Hackensack while Hudson County, which currently houses 800 federal immigration detainees, could potentially receive $35 million a year under a new contract freeholders approved earlier this month.  

The fourth location, officially called the Elizabeth Contract Detention Facility, is owned and run by CoreCivic Inc. and houses about 300 immigration detainees in an industrial area of Elizabeth. 

Amanda Gilchrist, public affairs director for CoreCivic, said in an email to The Record and NorthJersey.com this week that the company “has no plans to expand the Elizabeth facility at this time.”

A Maryland corporation with executive offices in Nashville, Tennessee, CoreCivic owns and manages 70 correctional detention and residential re-entry facilities, and manages an additional seven correctional and detention facilities owned by the government, according to its website. 

CoreCivic operates detention facilities in Arizona and Texas where migrants who have been detained after crossing the border have been separated from their children under the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance,” policy. The administration stopped the practice of separating children from parents at the border on June 20 after weeks of public outrage and global outcry. 

A federal judge in San Diego has set Thursday as the final deadline for the administration to reunite all families who were separated at the border under the policy. 

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