U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is looking for a clergy member willing to relocate to Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, where they will spend at least a year ministering to detained migrants rounded up under the Trump administration’s relentless deportation push.
A request for proposals issued Tuesday by ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations arm and reviewed by The Independent says the chaplain will start work at the facility in late August and minister to “major Christian denominations, including Church of the East, Oriental Orthodoxy, Eastern orthodoxy, Roman Catholicism, Protestantism, and Restorationism and etc, and other major religions including Islam, Hinduism, Rastafarian, Judaism, etc.”
They are expected to “facilitate counseling for detained aliens requesting spiritual, personal or bereavement needs,” plan and organize weekly “religious education” classes and “provide information and points of contact to detained aliens who seek conversion to a specific faith,” according to the solicitation.
However, it warns, they “shall not attempt to coerce a detainee to change religious preference.”
The feds also want the chaplain, who will be classified as a U.S. government contractor, to furnish up to 200 “religious items” per month, “in an unbiased and equitable way.”
These include, among other materials, pocket Bibles or Qurans, primarily in French and Arabic, rosaries and prayer beads, seder plates, kufis, prayer rugs, and “pictures of Santa Maria,” the solicitation states.
At the same time, ICE “has a very limited budget to purchase physical religious literature,” according to the solicitation. As such, clergy members are urged to request donations through religious organizations and NGOs, but ICE says it “will retain final approval authority prior to the religious literature being made available to the detainee population.”
Special meals may also be offered via the commissary, also at ICE’s sole discretion, “as long as access is equitable across religious faiths.”
Further, if a detainee wants to get married, the chaplain “shall follow the ICE PBNDS for marriage requests consistent with the security, order and management of the facility,” according to the solicitation - referring to ICE’s “Performance-Based National Detention Standards” handbook.
The ICE solicitation offers a small window into the agency’s normally opaque operations, and a limited peek at life at the notorious facility located within Naval Station Guantánamo Bay. Originally meant to hold accused terrorists picked up after the attacks of September 11, 2001, Guantánamo, which is highly secure and heavily restricted, has developed a reputation as a black hole.
Numerous U.S. presidents have vowed to shut it down, but Donald Trump said in January that up to 30,000 migrants would be sent to Gitmo, as the base is known.
Right now, the U.S. is holding 72 immigration detainees on the base, from 26 nations and six continents: Brazil, China, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, India, Jamaica, Kenya, Liberia, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Myanmar, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Peru, Romania, Russia, Somalia, St. Kitts-Nevis, the United Kingdom, Venezuela and Vietnam. Housing a person at Gitmo costs roughly $100,000 per day, according to Sen. Gary Peters (D-MI).
For its part, the military appears to acknowledge the myriad issues involved with a posting at Gitmo, describing its on-site chaplain as “a lifeline for service members navigating the emotional and ethical complexities of Department of Homeland Security-led migrant operations.”
One former immigration detainee who was held at Gitmo said he was kept in a dark, windowless cell and was forced to relieve himself in a bucket as he listened to screams from others, including threats to commit suicide.
In light of such reporting, the ICE solicitation says that the Gitmo chaplain must treat “all detainees… with care, dignity and respect.” Attending religious services – or not – must be their choice, according to the solicitation.
In addition to the chaplain, ICE will need up to a half-dozen “religious services program managers” to assist at Gitmo, as well as a “national program manager” to keep tabs on the goings-on and serve as a liaison to agency officials.
All should have the “ability to greet and deal tactfully with detainees,” accurately articulate “rules, orders, and instructions,” and be able to “communicate effectively in writing,” the solicitation says, adding that the chaplain’s staff “shall demonstrate sound judgment, even temperament and maintain self-control in situations that involve mental stress.”
Requirements for the chaplain job include a bachelor’s degree in religion, religious studies, theology, or a related field, and a minimum of five years’ ministry experience. If an applicant does not have a college degree, they must have a minimum of 10 years’ ministry experience, according to the solicitation, which says all must be fluent in English and Spanish.
Although the solicitation does not specify a salary, a recruitment ad for the position says it pays between $28 and $32 an hour.
Aside from the detention center at Guantánamo Bay, ICE is also seeking chaplains for detention facilities in Batavia, New York; Miami, Florida; Los Fresnos, Texas; El Paso, Texas; and Florence, Arizona. The contract includes an option to extend it four more years, with a potential end date of August 25, 2030.
Proposals are due by the close of business on Thursday.
ICE did not respond to a request for comment.
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