Solitary Confinement? To the INS It’s Just a Private Room

NEW YORK — Every bureaucracy has its own language, and the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service is no exception. Here’s a sampling of terms immigration officials use in place of everyday words:

* People locked up in correctional facilities are not “inmates” or “prisoners”; they are “detainees.”

* INS lockups are not called “correctional facilities” or “prisons” but “detention centers.”

* Detainees who cause disciplinary problems don’t go to “solitary confinement”; they are “given a private room” in a “special housing unit.”

* The 48 hours of mandatory detention that all undocumented asylum seekers face when they enter the United States is an “opportunity for consultation with friends, representatives, etc.”

* Immigrants without proper documentation are not “deported”; they are “removed.” The speedy deportation policy enacted in 1997 is “expedited removal.”

* A “green card” is “employment authorization.”

* A local jail that rents bed space to the INS isn’t a jail; it’s an “IGSA.” That stands for the Intergovernmental Service Agreement that allows one government agency to perform a function on behalf of another government agency.