DHS says none of this is its fault. The agency that built the facilities, filled them with captives, and hired the contractors insists it has no responsibility for what those contractors do once the door closes. When a guard rapes a detainee, the government points at the operator. When the operator is asked, it points at the individual. I requested comments from CoreCivic on conditions at Dilley. The company did not respond. Nobody responds. That is the point.
The entire system is designed so that a man can sexually abuse a woman in federal custody for five months and no one in the chain of command ever has to say his name in public. A detainee cannot choose who watches her cell, cannot leave, and cannot safely report what was done to her because every mechanism for reporting has been gutted. One woman at an East Coast compound filed a complaint and was thrown into solitary confinement as punishment. Others never spoke. They understood what happens to women who file complaints.