The D.C.-based Acacia Center for Justice is squarely at odds with the Trump administration
A left-wing group that serves as the lead contractor for a massive federal immigration contract claims the immigration system is “intentionally designed” to exploit “Black and brown people,” opposes the use of police officers for “immigration purposes,” and says “no immigrant should be detained.”
Acacia Center for Justice, based in Washington, D.C., is one of the largest federal immigration contractors, overseeing a $769 million program that provides lawyers for unaccompanied alien children and adults in immigration court hearings and deportation proceedings.
The group says its aim is to provide due process rights for illegal aliens. But it also calls for a radical upheaval of the immigration and deportation system—goals that are starkly at odds with the Trump administration’s objectives.
Launched in 2022, Acacia Center argues that “no immigrant should be detained” and that electronic surveillance to track illegal aliens “must be abolished.” According to the center, “the use of local law enforcement for immigration purposes … must be dismantled.”
It maintains that the immigration detention and deportation system is “intentionally designed to exploit, exclude, criminalize, detain and deport” people deemed to be “undeserving of inclusion in our national fabric, particularly Black and brown people.”
That puts it squarely at odds with the Trump administration, which has pledged to increase deportations of illegal aliens dramatically. The administration has threatened to pull federal funds from sanctuary cities and states that prohibit local law enforcement from cooperating with Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers. Trump has ordered federal agencies to shut down the kinds of diversity, equity, and inclusion policies pushed by the Acacia Center.
In a report last June, Acacia Center recommended that the Executive Office for Immigration Review, the Department of Justice subagency that handles immigration cases, implement “gender affirming language in immigration court.” Acacia Center demanded that immigration lawyers and judges use correct pronouns for illegal aliens and said that “repeated conduct that fails to affirm gender identity for noncitizens” is a violation of federal anti-discrimination laws.
“It would be absurd for the government to continue funding a soft-on-crime, open borders activist group that has openly stated its intention to work against the incoming administration,” said Parker Thayer, a senior analyst at the Capital Research Center, a watchdog group that launched the DOGE Files, a project to identify wasteful federal spending.
The administration froze funding for some of Acacia Center’s programs as part of a broad spending freeze across most federal agencies. According to Acacia Center, the freeze affected four programs, though not its larger contract that provides legal services for unaccompanied alien children.
“The Acacia Center for Justice is committed to upholding the U.S. Constitution’s demand for due process for everyone in the United States, which includes immigrants and children who arrive in our nation alone. Programs that ensure due process, like the ones Acacia administers, are critical for upholding these protections and make the immigration court system more efficient,” Mike Corradini, Acacia’s deputy chief of programs, told the Washington Free Beacon.
“We are ready to work with the Department of Justice to review and rapidly restore these essential services so that Acacia and our partners in the legal field can continue to deliver on the promise of justice for all,” said Corradini.
But its statements about federal immigration policy—and Trump—could put that funding in jeopardy.
“No election result will erase the diversity and strength of our multicultural origins,” Acacia executive director Shaina Aber said in a statement on Nov. 6. “Whatever comes, our partners will fight to ensure due process protections are not jettisoned in favor of politically motivated scapegoating.”
Acacia Center is a spinoff of the Vera Institute of Justice, a Brooklyn-based nonprofit that has called to defund police departments and abolish immigration enforcement agencies. Acacia took over the unaccompanied children program from Vera Institute in December 2023. Acacia hired many of the Vera Institute staff members to continue working on the unaccompanied alien children program, the group said in a 2023 press release.
Though Vera Institute no longer receives federal dollars for immigration contracts, it was awarded millions of dollars in Biden administration grants last year for criminal justice issues. Last year, the Department of Justice awarded Vera Institute $2 million to develop “municipal safety hubs,” an alternative to using traditional police forces to address “disturbances” and “survival behaviors,” such as “public disturbances … public intoxication, and trespassing.” Vera Institute has called to “radically dismantle” the policing system, the Washington Free Beacon reported.
This article was originally published at freebeacon.com
