Hutto detention center united diverse group in protest; group's efforts helped lead to an overhaul of nation's immigrant detention policies
"The policy shift might not have been possible, according to some analysts, if not for the work of an unlikely but effective patchwork alliance of attorneys and community activists that emerged after Hines' and Valdez's unsettling initial visits to the Hutto center. The partnership quickly mushroomed to include hundreds, if not thousands, of people, including twenty-somethings and senior citizens, Williamson County residents, immigration reform advocates, human rights groups, documentary filmmakers, immigration clinic students and faculty and the American Civil Liberties Union. Though participants say they were not always on the same page, they were unified in their unrelenting calls for the government to close the center and to stop detaining families there."
JUAN CASTILLO in the Austin American-Statesman.