In Otero

Emilien Bernard and Pauline Laplace are two alternative free-lance journalists working for the Marseille critical monthly CQFD, which has a substantial French global distribution (about 10, 000 copies) and argues for an anarchist perspective. CQFD means Ce Qu’il Faut Démontrer. The two journalists travelled to the USA to report about the southern wall.  A special dossier “USA: droit dans le mur” (“USA going right in the wall”??), was published in the December 2025  issue of the magazine (https://cqfd-journal.org/).

Emilien was arrested by the border police and was only liberated after a week–after the intervention of several French institutions and mainly international journalists. This article has been translated from French.

Arrested!

We think we’re ordinary tourists, safe from trouble, and BAM! we find ourselves locked in an immigration detention center in the depths of New Mexico–the ICE Otero Processing Center. This is the story of a week of incarceration alongside asylum seekers imprisoned by this damn Uncle Sam.

Ouch! Handcuffed on my wrists, thrown around in a van, I regularly hit my head against the metal wall. This makes the two cops at the front smile, who refuse to answer me when I ask them our destination. Arrested at the border post separating Ciudad Juarez (Mexico) from El Paso (Texas) for a bad visa, I have just spent 48 hours in a cell of twelve square meters in the company of a dozen companions in misfortune and a survival blanket – “the party”.

After half an hour of bumps, we approach Chapparal, a town in New Mexico where a sinister prison complex called the Otero County Processing Center was inaugurated in 2008. It is managed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), an agency created in 2001 in the paranoid aftermath of the September 11th attacks. It is ICE that presides over the destinies of migrants imprisoned here, often for long months. And I quickly understand that she is my new landlady.

Prison Dormitory

The first glance is creepy. Huge buildings set in the desert like concrete monoliths, capable of holding a thousand people and surrounded by two high fences decorated with barbed wire. Prison officers everywhere, armed with batons and tear gas canisters. And inmates dressed in similar uniforms, except that some are blue, others orange and the last red – marking their level of “dangerousness”. I receive the blue costume and, relieved of my meager possessions, am escorted to my new home. Entitled “Charlie One”, it is a high-ceilinged dormitory that looks like an agricultural shed and accommodates around fifty men. The comfort level is moderate–around 200 square meters inhabited by metal bunk beds, the same area dedicated to the leisure area (with ten tables and two TVs) and toilets/showers. To season it all, a piss yellow paint which adds to the gloominess of the place.

While bad, ultra-violent prison films play in my head, the reception committee quickly reassures me. Miguel, a placid forty-year-old Mexican with a big paunch, shows me my bed, “bed seventeen”, and patiently explains to me the different habits and customs of the house. Basically, maintain order and cleanliness so that detention conditions are not made worse by the mess. For the rest, I am entitled to a threadbare blanket, a mini toothbrush and a presentation of the different people retained here. After this security check, I get my nickname: “El François”. “The Frenchman”, the only one to be imprisoned here. “Cocorico”. Maybe “Stuck-up”?

Roommates

“What are you writing?” Luis asks me the next day, when he sees me seated at a table with a sheet of paper and a pencil, the only “leisure” objects provided at will. “People’s lives here”, which I stammer, in bad Spanish. He takes a seat in front of me and begins to tell me about his journey. In his forties, with a strangely wavy hairstyle that he repaints every ten minutes, the man who comes from Venezuela, which he had to leave for political reasons, is verbose: “I have enough to write a book with all my adventures to reach the United States. Hey, do you know the Darien Jungle between Colombia and Panama? Like a lot of people here, I had to go through it. Can you imagine what it’s like to cross four days with snakes, other poisonous things, the fear of dying in the middle of nowhere?” He has been here for 10 months, recollecting his memories, proud to have arrived this far in his journey, fearing only one thing–his probable expulsion.

Once my position as a journalist is known, it does not take me long to meet other figures of the place. In bed thirty-two, there is Petrus, from Haiti, who speaks broken but lilting French. He’s a bit like the Tramp of the room, who repeatedly blunders, bumps into the beds and is regularly reprimanded by the guards. This is the second time that he has been stuck at Otero, hence his orange uniform as a repeat offender, after journeys that he modestly describes as “complicated”: “I faced so many obstacles, you can’t imagine. Especially in Mexico, where I was held for a while for ransom. ” Since he’s always being an idiot, everyone likes him, and when it’s time for an interview with ICE agents to examine his right to asylum, the whole room offers their advice–T-shirt tucked into pants, hairstyle shiny with saliva, careful gait.

Like the twenty other dormitories, Charlie One welcomes a mosaic of more or less intertwined destinies. The majority of those imprisoned are in their twenties and are Spanish-speaking–they come from Mexico, Central America (Nicaragua, Salvador, etc.) and Latin America (Colombia, Ecuador, etc.). And then there are the more “distant” destinies, like these two Bangladeshis who took advantage of a visa for Guyana before undertaking the great crossing, or the inseparable trio formed by two Egyptians and a Jordanian. As for the Russian Aleksander, champion of pacing with a furrowed brow, he does not wish to return to his journey, just says he is a political opponent of Tsar Putin. He’s not the only one to act like this. Because on a daily basis there is something of an unspoken rule: aside from good administrative news, we talk little about what happened, nor about this temporary prison. Do not add to the darkness, but focus on the grace of God, omnipresent as Catholic bigots are legion, or the vicissitudes of Power 4 (one of the rare games available at the leisure corner). Another register, that of childishness, from fart competitions to jokes, defusing the heaviness of what surrounds us: the stupefying confinement or the plastic meals swallowed at full speed under the pressure of the guards in overcrowded refectories—”You are not here to talk!” As for the collective readings of the Bible before the lights go out, followed by religious songs sung with fervor, they allow us to populate dreams with less confining horizons, to escape to azure skies where the ICE is less icy.

Up Trump

On November 5, the day of Trump’s triumph, one of the two TVs was tuned to the special evening broadcast by the Mexican channel Telemundo. Most of those present have little interest in it, except to make a casual joke about Trump’s face or Kamala’s butt. Paradoxically, a good half of my roommates say they are in favor of the Republican candidate who has announced he wants to expel millions of illegal exiles. “He’s a strong and believing man, that’s what I remember”, says the ultra-Catholic and ultra-strong Colombian, Kristofer. Luis, the wavy, also leans towards the king of MAGA: “Yes, I prefer Trump but I have a reason. The figures are clear: there are more expulsions under the Democrats. And it was Biden who signed this damn law last June.  The rest is smoke and mirrors.”

Fifty years on the clock, relaxed Buddha face, Marcos reacts to Luis’s words by gently chastising him: “If Trump wins, you’re going back to Venezuela, my guy.” Nevertheless, he says he understands the Republican vote among Hispanics, and does not flinch when two young Venezuelans say: “Up Trump!” while passing in front of the television. “It’s normal that they like this guy: he embodies order. And many of us come from countries where there is a form of social chaos, aggravated by the rise of gangs”, he explains. Marcos is well placed to talk about it. After ten years exiled in the United States, he returned to his native Ecuador in 2020. A bad memory: “In my neighborhood in Quito, everyone thought I was rich because I came back from the USA.  When a local gang started extorting me, I had to pay the equivalent of 10,000 euros. Afterwards, I had nothing left. The death threats continued, with calls every night. When they burned my car, I decided to leave.” His travel story resembles that of many detainees: the hell of the jungle in Panama, the extortion of money throughout the journey, especially in Mexico where the cartels take advantage of the travelers’ vulnerability. And here he is in Otero, immersed in this uncertain temporality specific to this type of place, where the arbitrariness of the administration makes and unmakes the passing seconds, the lives. His wife and two children may be waiting for him in the United States, but he has been languishing here for four long months and is not sure of obtaining asylum.

When I woke up at 6 AM, it was a guard who announced the official victory to me, rejoicing at my decomposed face. “He’s straight in his boots, I trust him”, adds the one who tells me that she voted for him with enthusiasm. Necessarily!

Otero Blues

Built in 2008, the Otero County Processing Center has built a deplorable reputation over the years. Several people have died there because they did not receive basic medical treatment, like the Mexican Rafael Barcenas-Padilla (51 years old) in 2016 or the trans Salvadoran asylum seeker Johana Medina Leon (25 years old) in 2019. Another telling case: in July 2024, five Venezuelans began a hunger strike to denounce their conditions of detention and the length of their incarceration, before being placed in solitary confinement. Associations supporting exiles highlight the human and health deficiencies faced by detainees, despite being incarcerated without legal charge. This is undoubtedly partly due to the fact that the management of the prison complex has been entrusted to a private company which only seeks one thing: profits.

On the walls of the detention center, we can read in various places this inscription in large black lettering: “MTC corrections – Believe it or not, I care “. MTC stands for: Management and Training Corporation, one of the main American companies dedicated to the lucrative prison business. And the slogan can be translated as follows: “Believe it or not, I care about you”. Well, in a sense, yes, it is believable. Because in Otero every imprisoned man is a source of profit. Internal prison documents reveal that MTC receives around a hundred dollars per person per night. But that’s not all. In this place, everything is done to maximize the greenbacks extracted. The three daily meals that taste like cardboard are cooked and distributed by prisoners, paid derisory wages. Jimmy, 20 years old, with the face of a laughing college student, tells me that he works more to take his mind off things than for the two dollars per hour that we pay him. As for cleaning the dormitories, it’s even simpler: a compulsory chore imposed on inmates, who take turns mopping the floors or scrubbing the toilets morning and evening.  The height of indecency–communications with the outside world are done through an expensive system, an application called “Getting Out” (escape), on which detainees and their loved ones are invited to pay tidy sums to talk, via a few collective tablets placed in a corner of the dormitory. My loved ones paid the price: 50 dollars for 20 minutes of discussion; it’s not far from the most hackneyed scam.

The last pernicious link in the chain, discipline. A head of barracks is unofficially responsible for pacifying daily life in exchange for a few privileges (double the queue for the canteen, wear a cap, lead evening prayers, etc.). Luckily, mine is nice despite the gang tattoos that eat up his face. He calls everyone “mano”, gives boxing lessons to his friends and does not abuse his little power. As for the real guards, they like to flaunt their nuisance abilities: like the perverse supervisor who takes advantage of the regular “count” (a count of prisoners) to humiliate those whose heads do not belong to him–whether it is a bed “poorly done” or poorly stored shoes at the foot of the beds.

The luck of Francis

After a week of detention, while the Consulate forecasts that I will be there for at least two months, a guard tells me that I am leaving the premises. Kafka is over, thanks to an incredible team of friends who, in France and the United States, have fired all guns blazing in anti-repression bulldozer mode. As I left the dormitory, clumsily packing up the few things piled under my mattress, a general cry rang out: “Long live François!” Some bang on the metal bedding, others gently applaud my timid proclamation “Luck”; all display the solidarity felt for a week: whoever is locked up here is a comrade.

Still. From the height of my privilege, Francois is quickly released, I was able to touch for a second the great filth at work here. The stupefying confinement. The asylum lottery after months/years of exile. And this human bouillabaisse which resists being assigned to nothingness. I think back to Freddy working in the paltry library, a few law textbooks to boost his file. To Marcos, doing everything to reassure me when I arrived here. To Jeff, from the room, who thanks Jesus for having taught him to better love the “hermanos” who surround him. To the ironic laughter triggered in the dormitory by the mention of “American Dream”. To Jimmy, returning with red eyes from an interview with ICE, muttering under his breath: “They are deporting me to Honduras!” And I leave the place moved, all the more convinced that the prophets of doom will end up, one day, giving way to this great fraternal cry invoked by the border jumpers. Amen.

Post Script: The “Mcdonaldization” of the bars

An often-cited figure perfectly illustrates the ignominy of prison policy in the USA: while the country holds a quarter of the world’s prison population, it represents less than 5% of the global population. The highest incarceration rate in the world (655 people per 100,000 inhabitants), well ahead of China (65) or Russia (405).

This race towards generalized imprisonment is notably the consequence of the partial privatization of prisons initiated in the very neo-liberal Reagan years in the USA, against a backdrop of the “war on drugs”. The first private prison was built in Texas in 1984. And today there are around twenty states which partially practice this unbridled neo-liberalization of bars–the record: more than 40% of private penitentiary establishments in New Mexico. Companies benefiting from this windfall can in particular count on “occupancy clauses” ensuring that at least 80% of their establishment will be filled, under penalty of being paid compensation by the States spitting in the basin. Consequence: a “McDonaldization” of prisons, with an obsession with low costs and a quest for short-term profitability. A democratic regression summarized by the great writer of noir novels Don Winslow, in The Border: “The war on drugs has become a self-sustaining economic machine. Cities that once fought to accommodate factories now compete to build prisons. With the ‘privatization of prisons’ – I can’t think of a more appalling combination of words – we have made detention profitable.”

Privatization also concerns the confinement of exiled people, in a context of increasing confinements. Congress thus voted last January to increase the credits granted to the ICE agency for the detention of irregular migrants, increasing them from 2.9 to 3.4 billion dollars. The years to come should not deviate from this development, with the election of Trump announcing yet another over-repression of exile–with detentions as a result. One more effort and the whole country will be behind bars.

1. Reference to the decree issued by the American president on June 5, 2024, which strongly limits the right to asylum in the United States.
2. See the inspiring “Otero County Processing Center Timeline” list from the Innovation Law Lab website at https://innovationlawlab.org/otero-county-processing-center/. See also https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jun/12/trans-woman-death-us-custody-ice-deportation.
3. Read, in particular, “Why doesn’t anyone investigate that place?” (dedicated to Otero). available on the Freedom for Immigrants website, https://www.freedomforimmigrants.org/report-on-otero.
4. Since 2020, the complex has also held women, imprisoned in a separate wing.
5. Gigantic thanks to those who recognize themselves.
6. Franck Vindevogel, America’s Prisons. Presses Universitaire du Septentrion, 2020.
7. Figures available on the site https://ourworldindata.org/.  “Prison population rate”, 2018 data.