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Independent: They donated millions to Trump — now, ICE detention providers are reaping the rewards

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Private contractors run many of ICE’s largest detention facilities. Now, with a push to deport more and more immigrants, these companies stand to win big under Trump.

Two issues here:

  1. Congress must have the power to regulate and/or ban campaign activity by corporations and PACS. This will require a constitutional amendment.
  2. We need to stop the expansion of detention facilities for immigrants.

For many workers or organizations reliant on the federal government, President Donald Trump’s return to office has meant jobs, funding and entire agencies slashed, as the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) claims to have cut $202 billion.

But one industry has seen exponential growth — and expects even more to come: immigration detention.

“Private prison companies have been so giddy since last November, about the prospect of making billions of dollars at the expense of every American,” Stacy Suh, director at Detention Watch Network, told The Independent.

And the companies made sure to help Trump get elected.

America’s two leading detention companies, Geo Group and CoreCivic, were among the Trump campaign’s most notable donors last year, with executives and subsidiaries donating a total of $2.7 million to the president’s campaign and associated political action committees.

CoreCivic even bestowed over $500,000 towards Trump’s inauguration this year, while Geo Group contributed to his 2016 inauguration fund.

Trump’s Big, Beautiful, Bill set aside an unprecedented$45 billion for ICE to boost immigration detention. As the two largest detention powerhouses in the U.S., both Geo Group and CoreCivic stand to win big.

As soon as Trump won the election last November, CoreCivic’s share price saw a huge spike, nearly doubling from $13.63 per share to $22.13 per share in just one week.

GeoGroup’s share price jumped from $15.13 to $25.05 in the same post-election period.

This is likely because the privately-run facilities house 86 percent of the detained immigrant population, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC).

Yet just 6 percent of Americans believe that ICE detention centers should be run privately, an exclusive poll for The Independent can reveal, with the majority saying facilities should be run by federal or state governments, according to Prolific.

Over 60,000 people are currently held in immigration detention across the U.S., according to ICE records seen by The New York Times.

That number has already jumped by 54 percent since Trump’s return, with average detention populations under the Biden administration around 39,000, according to TRAC.

But though the government may determine their future, the 20 largest ICE detention centers are all operated by private companies, according to TRAC’s data in January.

GeoGroup and CoreCivic are the leading operators, both in terms of facilities operated and their capacity. Other private firms, like Lasalle Corrections and Management & Training Corporation (MTC), also have contracts to run ICE facilities.

CoreCivic runs the biggest detention centre in the country — Adams County Correctional Facility in Natchez, Missouri, with over 2,100 detainees on average each day. The new federal facility at Fort Bliss may soon take the cake, however, with a capacity of 5,000 people.

Both CoreCivic and GeoGroup provide both traditional prison incarceration services, and immigration detention services, to federal and state governments.

But with a slowdown in incarceration and greater focus on rehabilitation in recent years, prison contracts have been drying up — and increased immigration detention contracts has become more foundational to their business models.

One of Trump’s first actions in office was also to end the Biden-era ban on private prison providers, allowing companies like GeoGroup and CoreCivic to once again contract with the Department of Justice.

When asked for comment about its reliance on punitive policies by the new administration to build its business, CoreCivic noted that it does not enforce immigration laws, or arrest anyone, or have any say over an individual’s deportation — but it acknowledged that Trump’s policies does provide it with growth opportunities.

“As the current administration is exploring all options available to them to address the increasing demand for detention services and capacity, we expect that those options will include the high-quality solutions CoreCivic provides,” Ryan Gustin, director of Public Affairs at CoreCivic, told The Independent.

Meanwhile, a spokesperson for GeoGroup told The Independent that “simply put, our facilities are never overcrowded.”

But Freedom of Information Act requests by TRAC last month revealed that several facilities run by GeoGroup were significantly overcapacity on at least one day this year.

This includes GeoGroup’s Pine Prairie processing centre in Louisiana, which has a contractual maximum of 500 people but held 1,311 detainees at some point in 2025.

Immigration operations make up over a third of revenue for both Geo Group and Core Civic, latest financial reports show, making ICE their largest governmental partner.

“We are proud of the role our company has played for 40 years to support [ICE’s] law enforcement mission, over seven different Presidential Administrations,” a GEO Group spokesperson told The Independent.

Geo Group has been awarded nearly $8 billion in federal contracts over successive governments, according to the federal database, in addition to state contracts.

Over half of this ($4.4 billion) was awarded by ICE for immigration detention services.

Meanwhile CoreCivic has been awarded over $8.3 billion in federal contracts over time, with a quarter ($2 billion) of those being ICE contracts to run detention facilities.

“ICE’s budget now is larger than many militaries around the world, while our hospitals and schools remain underfunded, and people are losing their access to health care and food benefits,” said Suh.

The Independent contacted ICE for comment for this article but did not get a response.

Federal contracts from ICE have been steadily increasing since Trump’s first term (with for a brief time during the peak of the pandemic), according to the federal spending database, rising from $137.5 million awarded in 2016 to $463.4 million in 2025 so far.

ICE contracts awarded since January alone include $353.5 million to GeoGroup, $148 million to CoreCivic, and $313 million to CSI Aviation — ICE’s deportation flight contractor.

“There is more and more incentivization to cage people in immigration detention. The more people that they detain, the more their business grows,” Suh said. “Financial Incentives are really the bedrock of incarceration.”

And now, documents seen by The Washington Post reveal that ICE is planning to more than double detention capacity, from around 50,000 to more than 107,000 by January 2026.

These plans include opening or expanding 125 facilities before the end of the year – with over $1 billion in contracts each year between CoreCivic and GeoGroup, according to the Post’s analysis of ICE documents.

Already, both detention giants have seen a flood of new or amendedcontracts and have opened up new facilities to expand their capacity.

What’s more, ICE has issued nine of these contracts without allowing competitive bids, citing a national emergency at the Mexico border — meaning that CoreCivic secured the deal to reopen its contentiousLeavenworth facility without competition, according to PBS.

“We stay in regular contact with ICE and all our government partners to understand their changing needs, and we work within their established procurement processes. It is our policy to respect these processes,” Gustin told The Independent of CoreCivic’s contracts.

Since January alone, several facilities have been opened up to hold more immigrants in detention as ICE ramps up its raids.

In the Michigan town of Baldwin, former prison North Lake Correctional Facility has now reopened as an immigration center operated by Geo Group, to the tune of $70 million in annual revenue. The 1,800-bed facility opened in June despite facing significant pushback from residents and local protests.

And just last week, a tense dispute broke out at a local board meeting in Mason, Tennessee, over the reopening of a CoreCivic facility as an immigration detention center. Residents crowded the meeting and chanted outside in protest of the contract, which was ultimately approved, according to reports in the Tennessee Lookout.

“If ICE expansion plans are fully realized, that’s a massive shift in resources. It’s also a massive transformation in the very fabric of American society and how it operates,” Suh told The Independent.

“Communities across the country are rightly outraged about detention expansion happening on their doorstep. People are saying, ‘No, we don’t want detention in our community. We don’t want our neighbors to be torn apart away from their loved ones’.”

They donated millions to Trump, now ICE detention providers are reaping the rewards
Private contractors run many of ICE’s largest detention facilities. Now, with a push to deport more and more immigrants, these companies stand to win big under Trump. Alicja Hagopian reports.

https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-donors-ice-immigration-detention-private-funding-b2812474.html

CBS News: Kristi Noem says “Alligator Alcatraz” to be model for ICE state-run detention centers

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Perhaps coming soon to Arizona, Nebraska and Louisiana?

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem says “Alligator Alcatraz” will serve as a model for state-run migrant detention centers, and she told CBS News in an interview that she hopes to launch a handful of similar detention centers in multiple airports and jails across the country, in the coming months. Potential sites are already under consideration in Arizona, Nebraska and Louisiana. 

“The locations we’re looking at are right by airport runways that will help give us an efficiency that we’ve never had before,” Noem said, adding that she’s appealed directly to governors and state leaders nationwide to gauge their interest in contributing to the Trump administration’s program to detain and deport more unauthorized migrants. 

“Most of them are interested,” Noem said, adding that in states that support President Trump’s mission of securing the southern border, “many of them have facilities that may be empty or underutilized.”

The Department of Homeland Security strategy builds on the opening of a 3,000-bed immigration detention center at a jetport in South Florida last month. Dubbed Alligator Alcatraz by state and federal officials, the makeshift facility will cost an estimated $450 million to operate in its first year. Up and running in just 8 days, the tents and trailers at Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport are surrounded by 39 square miles of isolated swampland, boasting treacherous terrain and wildlife  

Last month, President Trump toured the facility, seeing rows of bunk beds lined up behind chain fences and encircled by razor wire. Mr. Trump joked to reporters there that “we’re going to teach them how to run away from an alligator if they escape prison.” Asked if the temporary facility would be a model of what’s to come, the president said he’d like to see similar operations in “many states.”

The Arizona’s governor’s office told CBS News it has not been approached about a state-run facility. 

Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen’s office said in a statement that his administration “continues to be in communication with federal partners on how Nebraska can best assist in these efforts,” but added that for now, “it is premature to comment” and the governor would “make details public at the appropriate time.”

For her part, Noem called the Alligator Alcatraz model “much better” than the current detention prototype, which largely contracts out its Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention capacity to for-profit prison companies and county jails. ICE is an agency that falls under DHS. This model relies on intergovernmental service agreements (IGSAs) negotiated and signed between ICE and individual localities. She called the Florida facility — with an eventual price tag of $245 per inmate bed, per night, according to DHS officials — a cost-effective option. “Obviously it was much less per-bed cost than what some of the previous contracts under the Department of Homeland Security were.”

According to the Office of Homeland Security Statistics, the estimated average daily cost of detaining an adult migrant in fiscal year 2024 was about $165, though the actual cost of detention typically varies based on region, length of stay and facility type.

Still, Noem argued that the new venues, all with close proximity to airports or runways, will help ICE to cut costs by “facilitating quick turnarounds.” 

“They’re all strategically designed to make sure that people are in beds for less days,” Noem said, adding that some of the facilities being considered are still undergoing vetting by the department and subject to ongoing negotiations. “It can be much more efficient once they get their hearings, due process, paperwork.”

Unlike Alligator Alcatraz, which uses funds from a shelter, food and transportation program run by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Noem said the state-based initiative will tap into a new $45 billion funding pool for ICE prompted by President Trump’s “big, beautiful bill”, which was signed into law last month. The pool of money is allocated specifically to the expansion of ICE’s detention network and will nearly double the agency’s bedspace capacity of 61,000 beds, based on cost analysis. As of Saturday, ICE was holding just over 57,000 individuals in its detention network in more than 150 facilities nationwide.

Noem — who has implemented a department-wide policy across DHS of personally approving each and every contract and grant over $100,000 — said keeping ICE detention contracts to a duration of under five years is now “the model we’ve pushed for.” For instance, she added, Alligator Alcatraz is a one-year contract that can be renewed. 

“For me personally, the question that I’ve asked of every one of these contracts is, why are we signing 15-year deals?” Noem said. “I have to look at our mission. If we’re still building out and processing 100,000 detention beds 15 years from now, then we didn’t do our job.”

The new policy is a departure from earlier agreements made under the Trump administration. In February, ICE signed a 15-year, $1 billion deal with the GEO Group, a private prison company, to reopen Delaney Hall, a two-story, 1,000-bed facility that ranks among the largest detention centers in the Northeast.

Still, Noem said she doesn’t feel the U.S. is moving away from a private detention model. “I mean, these are competitive contracts,” she said. “I want everybody to be at the table, giving us solutions. I just want them to give us a contract that actually does the job — a contract that doesn’t put more money in their pockets while keeping people in detention beds just for the sake of that contract.”

But Alligator Alcatraz has also come under fire from attorneys claiming that both the Trump and DeSantis administrations are holding detainees without charge or access to immigration courts, violating their constitutional rights. Attorneys argued in a legal filing last month that unauthorized migrants held at the Florida-run site have no legal recourse to challenge their detention. 

Lawyers and experts have also called into question the very legality of a state-run immigration detention center, given the federal government’s authority over immigration enforcement. Opening the detention center in the Everglades under Florida’s emergency state powers marked a departure from the federal government’s role of housing migrant detainees, an option typically reserved for those who’ve recently entered the country illegally or those with criminal convictions. 

A U.S. district judge last week ordered state and federal officials to provide a copy of the agreement showing “who’s running the show” at the Everglades immigrant-detention center. 

“Florida does not have the legal authority to detain undocumented immigrants in the absence of a contract with ICE,” said Kevin Landy, the director of detention policy and planning for ICE under President Barack Obama. “A state government can’t do that.” 

Detainees held at Alligator Alcatraz have also claimed unsanitary and inhumane conditions, including food with maggots, denial of religious rights and limited access to both legal assistance and water. Florida officials have denied the accusations. 

Still, tucked away in the Florida Everglades 45 miles west of Miami, if its location sounds treacherous, Noem concedes, that’s kind of the point. “There definitely is a message that it sends,” the secretary said. “President Trump wants people to know if you are a violent criminal and you’re in this country illegally, there will be consequences.”

Noem offered that deterrence is an effective strategy based on U.S. gathered intelligence “from three letter agencies, from other intelligence officials throughout the federal government and in a lot of the Latin American and South American countries” that indicates “overwhelmingly, what encourages people to go back home voluntarily is the consequences.”

“They see the laws being enforced in the United States,” Noem said. “They know when they are here illegally and if they are detained, they’ll be removed. They see that they may never get the chance to come back to America. And they’re voluntarily coming home.”

The DHS secretary met with Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum in March. “One of the questions I asked President Scheinbaum when I was in Mexico is, ‘Do you have any idea how many people may have come back to Mexico that we may not know about,'” Noem said. 

“[Sheinbaum] said 500,000 to 600,000 people have come back to Mexico voluntarily since President Trump’s been in office,” Noem continued, explaining that the Mexican president believes her reluctant citizens fear losing the chance to return to the U.S. on a visa or work program.

It’s a datapoint she solicits from many of the foreign leaders she meets with, including Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa, who shared a 90-minute lunch with the DHS secretary in Quito, last Thursday. “I asked him the same question,” Noem recalled. “He doesn’t have as many illegal immigrants in the United States as in Mexico and Venezuela, but he said he thinks over 100,000 of his citizens have come back to Ecuador. And that’s a huge number.” 

Noem reasoned that her Ecuadorian counterpart’s rough estimate is based on two factors — a strengthening Ecuadorian economy and a DHS television campaign launched across Latin and South America, warning prospective migrants not to enter or remain in the U.S. illegally. 

“He was very proud of the fact that he’s doing better with his economy. So there’s jobs,” Noem recounted. “But he said, you know, our ads are running in Ecuador. We’re telling people that, if you have family in the United States that are there illegally, it’s time to come home.”

Kristi Noem says “Alligator Alcatraz” to be model for ICE state-run detention centers
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem says possible new locations include Arizona, Nebraska and Louisiana.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/alligator-alcatraz-model-kristi-noem-homeland-security

Disability Rights California: “They Treat Us Like Dogs in Cages”

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Inside the Adelanto ICE Processing Center

“¡Nos tratan como perros!
¡Nos tratan como perros en jaulas!”

People being held at the Adelanto ICE Processing Center (“Adelanto”) shouted in Spanish about being treated like dogs in cages as Disability Rights California (“DRC”) conducted a monitoring visit on June 25, 2025. DRC monitored Adelanto after receiving alarming reports that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s (“DHS”) Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) was holding people with disabilities in unsafe and unsanitary conditions at Adelanto. ICE confines non-citizens at Adelanto, which is an immigration detention center in San Bernardino County, California. The facility is owned and operated by the GEO Group, Inc., a private company that ICE contracts with to provide custody services.

Disability Rights California is the designated protection and advocacy system for people with disabilities in the state. DRC is charged under federal and state laws with protecting and advocating for the rights of people with disabilities, including through the monitoring of facilities that provide care and treatment to such individuals.1

During the monitoring visit, DRC investigated the reports it received and sought to determine whether ICE and GEO Group are subjecting people with disabilities to abuse and neglect.2 DRC toured various areas of the Adelanto facility, including those used for intake, housing, segregation, medical and mental health care, recreation, and visitation. DRC also spoke with GEO Group representatives, ICE officials, and Adelanto staff, and interviewed 18 individuals detained at Adelanto.

Based on the conditions DRC observed, its interviews with detention center leadership and individuals held at Adelanto, and reviews of related information, DRC finds that ICE and GEO Group are subjecting people with disabilities to abuse and neglect. As detailed below, the conditions that DRC observed and the reports it received are alarming. DRC urges DHS, ICE, and the GEO Group to immediately address these issues and prevent further abuse and neglect of people with disabilities by ensuring:

  • Access to appropriate medical and mental health care;
  • Access to processes that properly address disability-related needs;
  • Access to basic needs, including adequate food, water, and clothing; and
  • Access to family and natural supports to prevent decompensation.

Disability Rights California protects and advocates for the rights of all people with disabilities in the State of California, regardless of their ethnicity, cultural background, language, or immigration status.

Many people migrating to the United States are forced to leave their countries due to political instability, dangerous conditions, or persecution. Many are seeking asylum. They exhibit high instances of trauma and present numerous mental health needs. Immigration detention facilities are generally ill-equipped, and are not the least restrictive setting to meet the medical, mental health, and other needs of adults and children with disabilities.

Disability Rights California has long fought for the de-institutionalization of people with disabilities and for their right to live and receive services in the community. Immigrants with disabilities deserve this same treatment.

Background

The reports DRC recently received about the conditions at Adelanto are similar to conditions DRC observed during its prior investigation of Adelanto in 2019.3 In 2019, DRC published a report that detailed serious issues with the conditions in which people with disabilities were held and the poor treatment to which they were subjected—ultimately finding that conditions at Adelanto resulted in the abuse and neglect of people with disabilities. As part of the June 25, 2025 visit, DRC also sought to determine whether conditions have changed since 2019. 

During DRC’s recent monitoring visit, ICE and GEO Group held nearly 1,400 people at Adelanto—a dramatic increase from the approximately 300 individuals it held there just weeks before.4 Due to the surging numbers of people at Adelanto, conditions appear to have quickly deteriorated. 

Overall, DRC found serious issues including: (1) inadequate access to medical treatment, such as life-saving medication and wound care, and exposure to widespread respiratory illnesses; (2) inadequate access to food and water, including extreme delays in meal distribution, provision of food that results in significant health issues, and a shortage of drinking water; (3) inadequate access to clean clothes, with many remaining in soiled clothing for long periods of time; and (4) minimal opportunities to contact family. Further intensifying these issues, many of the people DRC interviewed had never experienced incarceration and felt overwhelmed and terrified by their confinement in a locked, jail-like facility.5 

Findings

1. Inadequate Access to Medical and Mental Health Care and Disability Accommodations

During the monitoring visit, DRC observed and noted serious issues concerning inadequate access to medical and mental health care and failure to properly address disability-related accommodations.6 These issues appear to be ongoing, in part due to Adelanto staff difficulties in identifying and addressing the health care needs of detained individuals, particularly those with disabilities.7 These issues are compounded by the fact that many individuals detained at Adelanto have never been confined and do not know how to navigate the jail-like systems at Adelanto.

DRC met with many individuals during the monitoring visit who were not receiving proper medication to manage their medical conditions.8 One person reported that he needed to take diabetes medication twice per day but had only received it twice over the 10 days he had been detained—placing him at life-threatening risk of diabetic shock. Other individuals reported insufficient access to medication to manage severe asthma and urinary conditions or not having medications transferred from previous facilities to ensure continued treatment.9

One person reported that he needed to take diabetes medication twice per day but had only received it twice over the 10 days he had been detained—placing him at life-threatening risk of diabetic shock.

DRC also spoke with several individuals who reported inadequate medical treatment.10 DRC interviewed one person who had a large, swollen, untreated lump near her wrist, reportedly sustained when she was taken into ICE custody 17 days prior. DRC interviewed another individual using a prosthetic eye who was unable to clean the prosthesis to prevent infection. Although both individuals requested medical attention, neither received a response as of DRC’s visit.11 In addition, several individuals informed DRC that they did not understand how to make requests for medical care or declined to do so because Adelanto staff failed to respond. 

Individuals also reported contagious respiratory viruses quickly spreading due to the increased crowding at Adelanto. People consistently expressed concern that they received limited treatment, if any, to ease their symptoms. DRC also observed staff not wearing masks to prevent the spread of respiratory illnesses. These reports and observations are especially concerning given Adelanto’s prior record of inadequate COVID-19 policies and practices, which led to a 2020 court order limiting the number of individuals who could be held at Adelanto.12 

DRC also interviewed several individuals who reported experiencing mental health symptoms but not receiving mental health care.13 One individual, for example, described struggling with anxiety and panic attacks due to past traumatic events, including sexual assault and torture, that took place in his country of origin. He feared that he would be imprisoned and tortured again if he returned. Although he sought help from Adelanto staff for his mental health symptoms, he reported that he had not been evaluated yet despite being held in detention for over three weeks. Other people DRC interviewed also reported difficulty obtaining access to mental health services. Indeed, staff reported that there were only three psychologists to serve the population of nearly 1,400 as of June 25, 2025.

Several individuals with disabilities reported that they were not being afforded reasonable accommodations to manage their health.14 For example, two individuals reported acute spinal conditions that substantially impacted their ability to lie down to rest. The first individual said that the facility-issued mattress was damaged and was causing significant pain to his spine. He submitted multiple requests for a new or additional mattress but reportedly never received a response. Another person approached DRC and showed his broken hearing aid that needed repair.  

The troubling issues that DRC encountered are likely related to the recent sharp increase in the number of people held at Adelanto. Adelanto staff stated that the facility was not adequately staffed to respond to the sudden surge, so staff from other facilities were assisting with operations.

2. Inadequate Access to Food, Water, and Clothes

Based on DRC’s interviews and observations, DRC finds that ICE and GEO Group are failing to provide for individuals’ basic needs, including sufficient access to healthy food, water, and clean clothing.

Limited access to food was a recurring issue throughout DRC’s monitoring tour.15 While walking through the housing units, DRC observed several individuals pointing towards their mouths and shaking their heads “no” to indicate that they were not receiving food.

People also consistently reported extreme delays in meal distribution. During the visit, DRC asked Adelanto staff when they would serve lunch and staff said that “feeding” would be provided starting at 11 a.m. However, most of the people DRC interviewed between 1 p.m. and 4 p.m. reported that they had not received food since around 5 a.m. to 8 a.m. Many also said that they feared they would not eat again until potentially 10 p.m.

The inconsistency of, and significant delays in, meal distribution have left many individuals in Adelanto in prolonged states of hunger and physical pain. One individual reported experiencing significant weight loss in the 20 days since their arrival at Adelanto. For people with chronic medical conditions, the harmful impact of inconsistent meals may be even more serious. One individual reported that he had diabetes and was unable to properly manage his blood sugar because he did not know when to expect meals. DRC met multiple people with diabetes facing similar challenges. 

Most people DRC interviewed also reported that the quality of the food was poor or portions were too small to keep them satisfied. Many individuals shared that they are experiencing gastric issues due to poor food quality, including severe stomach cramping and pain.

DRC received similar reports of limited access to water.16 Adelanto brings large water coolers into the housing units, but the individuals DRC spoke to expressed concern that there is not enough water for everyone and people are dehydrated. They also raised safety concerns about the water from sinks and drinking fountains, which they said appears cloudy and has an unusual taste.

Many people also complained about the lack of access to clean clothes.17 Several individuals pulled on their shirts and shook their heads “no” to indicate that they did not have adequate clean clothing. One individual wearing visibly soiled clothing told DRC that Adelanto had not provided him with clean clothes for 20 days. He reported that after showering, he puts on the same soiled clothing out of necessity. Others reported having to wash their clothes by hand in the sink because Adelanto fails to provide sufficient clean clothes.

One individual wearing visibly soiled clothing told DRC that Adelanto had not provided him with clean clothes for 20 days.

3. Limited Connections with Family and Natural Supports 

During the monitoring visit, DRC received multiple reports of minimal opportunities to remain in contact with family and loved ones while in detention. Individuals reported limited access to phones/devices to make calls to loved ones, and calls were regularly disconnected. Two individuals also reported that they had been separated from and not been permitted to speak with their spouses, even though their spouses are also being held in Adelanto. Limiting access to family can exacerbate feelings of isolation, depression, and anxiety, particularly for people with disabilities.18 In fact, many people reported feelings of overwhelm, hopelessness, and fear. Given the unique stressors present in detention settings, facilitating connection with family and natural supports is critical to prevent people with mental health conditions from experiencing further psychological harm and decompensation.19  

Conclusion

The conditions that DRC observed at Adelanto on June 25, 2025, and the reports it received, are alarming. Based on the monitoring visit and related interviews, DRC finds that conditions at Adelanto continue to result in the abuse and neglect of people with disabilities. DHS, ICE, and GEO Group must safeguard the rights, safety, and dignity of the people detained at Adelanto. DRC urges DHS, ICE, and GEO Group to immediately address the issues detailed in this report and ensure the following:

  • Access to appropriate medical and mental health care;
  • Access to processes that properly address disability-related needs;
  • Access to basic needs, including adequate food, water, and clothing; and
  • Access to family and natural supports to prevent decompensation.

DRC has grave concerns that the recent surge of individuals being held in Adelanto will only place individuals with disabilities at even greater risk of abuse, neglect, and serious harm. The conditions at Adelanto make it clear that the current system of immigration detention is dangerous and inadequate for all people, especially for those with disabilities. 

  • 1.See 42 U.S.C. §§ 15001 et seq. (“Developmental Disabilities Assistance and Bill of Rights Act”); 29 U.S.C. §§ 794e et seq. (“Protection and Advocacy of Individual Rights Act”); 42 U.S.C. §§ 10801 et seq. (“Protection and Advocacy for Individuals with Mental Illness Act”); Cal. Welf. & Inst. Code §§ 4900 et seq. (“Protection and Advocacy Agency”).
  • 2.“Abuse” and “neglect” are defined in federal and state law and their implementing regulations. See 42 C.F.R. § 51.2; 45 C.F.R. § 1326.19; Cal. Welf. & Inst. Code § 4900.
  • 3.Disability Rights California, There Is No Safety Here: The Dangers for People with Mental Illness and Other Disabilities in Immigration Detention at GEO Group’s Adelanto ICE processing Center (2019), https://www.disabilityrightsca.org/system/files/file-attachments/DRC_REPORT_ADELANTO-IMMIG_DETENTION_MARCH2019.pdf [hereinafter DRC’s 2019 Adelanto Report].
  • 4.Charles Homans & Philip Montgomery, Trump Got the Fight He Wanted. Did it Turn Out the Way He Expected?, N.Y. Times (June 21, 2025), https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/21/magazine/trump-los-angeles-immigration.html
  • 5.People who are detained by ICE are civil, not criminal, detainees. See, e.g., Zadvydas v. Davis, 533 U.S. 678, 690 (2001); Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 530, 536 (1979).
  • 6.The Performance-Based National Detention Standards define reasonable accommodations as: [A]ny change or adjustment in detention facility operations, any modification to detention facility policy, practice, or procedure, or any provision of an aid or service that permits a detainee with a disability to participate in the facility’s programs, services, activities, or requirements, or to enjoy the benefits and privileges of detention programs equal to those enjoyed by detainees without disabilities. U.S. Immigration & Customs Enf’t, Performance-based National Detention Standards (2011, rev. 2016), https://www.ice.gov/doclib/detention-standards/2011/pbnds2011r2016.pdf [hereinafter PBNDS].
  • 7.See DRC’s 2019 Adelanto Report, supra note 2, at 40-44.
  • 8.See PBNDS, supra note 5, § 4.3(V)(G), (H), (U) (discussing standards for medication management).
  • 9.See id. § 4.3(V)(Z) (discussing standards for continuity of care).
  • 10.See id. §§ 2.13 (discussing standards for communication between staff and detainees), 4.8 (discussing standards for assessing and identifying disabilities and accommodations).
  • 11.After the June 25 visit, DRC submitted individual inquiries to ICE, some of which ICE stated were addressed.
  • 12.ACLU of S. Cal., Roman v. Wolf, https://www.aclusocal.org/en/cases/roman-v-wolf (last visited July 15, 2025).
  • 13.Studies show that immigration detention is associated with negative and harmful impact on mental health. See Altaf Saadi, Caitlin Patler & Paola Langer, Duration in Immigration Detention and Health Harms, 8 JAMA Network Open no. 1 (2025), https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2829506#zoi241575r33.
  • 14.See PBNDS, supra note 5, § 4.8 (discussing standards for assessing and identifying disabilities and accommodations).
  • 15.See id. 6 § 4.1, (discussing food service standards).
  • 16.See id. § 4.1(D)(1), (requiring clean and potable drinking water to be available).
  • 17.See id. § 4.5(V)(A) (requiring the regular issuance and exchange of clothing, bedding, linens, towels and personal hygiene items).
  • 18.Saadi, Patler & Langer, supra note 13.
  • 19.Practices that are likely to cause immediate psychological harm or result in long-term harm if the practices continue may constitute abuse. See, e.g., Cal. Welf. & Inst. Code § 4900(b).
“They Treat Us Like Dogs in Cages” Inside the Adelanto ICE Processing Center | Disability Rights California
DRC monitored Adelanto after receiving alarming reports that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s (“DHS”) Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) was holding people with disabilities in unsafe and unsanitary conditions at Adelanto.

https://www.disabilityrightsca.org/drc-advocacy/investigations/inside-the-adelanto-ice-processing-center

LAist: Disabled immigrants are being abused and neglected inside Adelanto Detention Center, report says

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A disability-rights group says immigrant detainees inside a federal detention center near Victorville are being abused and neglected, in part because the population inside the facility has grown rapidly in recent weeks, according to a new report.

Investigators with the non-profit watchdog Disability Rights California toured the Adelanto Detention Center late last month. They said they interviewed 18 people during the monitoring visit.

They also noted in the report, released last week, that the population inside the facility had risen dramatically from approximately 300 people in the weeks before the visit to nearly 1,400. The increase coincided with immigration agents ramping up raids across the L.A. region.

“Due to the surging numbers of people at Adelanto, conditions appear to have quickly deteriorated,” according to the report.

Spokespeople for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which rents the facility, and The GEO Group, which operates it, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Rep. Jay Obernolte, a Republican who represents the Adelanto area, recently toured the facility and praised its operations.

“Those in custody are provided with access to medical care, legal counsel, meals, and the full rights guaranteed under federal law,” he said in a statement.

We reached out to two Democratic members of Congress who toured the facility, but they were unavailable for comment in time or did not respond.

The findings

The report provides a rare look inside the conditions at the Adelanto facility.

Overall, Disability Rights California said it found serious issues including:

  • Inadequate access to medical treatment, such as life-saving medication and wound care, and exposure to widespread respiratory illnesses; 
  • Inadequate access to food and water, including extreme delays in meal distribution, provision of food that results in significant health issues, and a shortage of drinking water; 
  • Inadequate access to clean clothes, with many remaining in soiled clothing for long periods of time; and 
  • Minimal opportunities to contact family. 

“Further intensifying these issues, many of the people DRC interviewed had never experienced incarceration and felt overwhelmed and terrified by their confinement in a locked, jail-like facility,” the report states.

Among the 18 people interviewed during the June 25 visit, many said they were not receiving proper medication to manage their medical conditions, according to Disability Rights California.

One person reported he needed to take diabetes medication twice per day but had only received it twice over the 10 days he had been detained — placing him at life-threatening risk of diabetic shock, according to the report. Other people reported insufficient access to medication to manage severe asthma and urinary conditions, or not having medications transferred from previous facilities to ensure continued treatment.

Access to clean clothes is another problem, investigator Paula Sandoval told LAist. She said she met one man who said he didn’t have access to clean clothes for nearly three weeks.

Another investigator, Robert Reyes Villagomez, described a Venezuelan man who said he had panic attacks stemming from his fear of returning to the country. The investigator said the man came to the U.S. seeking asylum because he was tortured and sexually assaulted by government officials.

“He hadn’t seen or talked to anybody on the medical team despite putting in written medical accommodation requests multiple times,” Villagomez said.

Staff at Adelanto told investigators there were three psychologists to serve the entire population inside the detention center.

According to the report, two people told investigators they had acute spinal conditions that substantially impacted their ability to lie down to rest. The first person said his mattress was damaged and causing significant pain to his spine. He asked for a new mattress, the report states, but never received a response.

‘Grave concerns’

The report focused on people with disabilities, but it noted many of the detainees who were interviewed or otherwise interacted with said they faced the same conditions.

“While walking through the housing units, investigators observed several individuals pointing towards their mouths and shaking their heads ‘no’ to indicate that they were not receiving food,” the report stated.

Most people who were interviewed also reported that the quality of the food was poor or portions were too small to keep them satisfied. Many shared that they are experiencing gastric issues due to poor food quality, including severe stomach cramping and pain.

During the monitoring visit, detainees told investigators they had minimal opportunities to remain in contact with family and loved ones while in detention. They reported limited access to phones to make calls, and those calls were regularly disconnected.

The watchdog group said it has “grave concerns” that a continued surge of detainees held in Adelanto will put those with disabilities at even greater risk of abuse, neglect and harm, according to the report.

“The conditions at Adelanto make it clear that the current system of immigration detention is dangerous and inadequate for all people, especially for those with disabilities.”

The report is available online here.

Disabled immigrants are being abused and neglected inside Adelanto Detention Center, report says
Immigrant detainees have complained of poor conditions inside center amid period of increased ICE sweeps.

https://laist.com/news/disabled-immigrants-are-being-abused-and-neglected-inside-adelanto-detention-center-report-says

USA Today: Immigrants forced to eat ‘like a dog’ in detention centers

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Forced to eat the day’s only meal “like a dog,” with their hands shackled behind their back. Detained for days with nothing but shoes for a pillow and no other bedding ‒ just cold, concrete floors and constant fluorescent lighting. Medical care that denied a man with diabetes insulin for a week and may have contributed to at least one death.  

A Human Rights Watch report says three Miami immigrant detention facilities have subjected people to conditions so inhumane they have become, at times, life-threatening. Many ICE detention facilities are becoming overcrowded and conditions are deteriorating, according to the July 21 report.

The report, which drew from the testimonials of 17 detainees, examined conditions since President Donald Trump took office in January. Investigators say conditions at the Krome North Processing Center, Federal Detention Center and Broward Transitional Center flout international law on holding people in immigrant detention and federal government standards.

The conditions for people held in the detention facilities “are not the way that any legitimate, functioning government should treat people within its custody,” report author and editor Alison Leal Parker, deputy director of the Human Rights Watch’s US Program, said.

While the facilities have had issues predating this administration, Parker said Trump administration officials have been unwilling to uphold standards to properly treat immigrant detainees. The conditions indicate the system is “overwhelmed, overcrowded and chaotic,” she said.

Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary for public affairs at the Department of Homeland Security, said claims of subprime conditions at Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention centers are “FALSE.”

“All detainees are provided with proper meals, medical treatment, and have opportunities to communicate with their family members and lawyers,” McLaughlin said in an emailed statement. “Ensuring the safety, security, and well-being of individuals in our custody is a top priority at ICE. ICE has higher detention standards than most U.S. prisons that hold actual U.S. citizens.”

Southern, Republican-led states have emerged as key partners in the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. Florida stood up a tent city called “Alligator Alcatraz.” Georgia is expanding its largest ICE detention center. And Louisiana is hosting the most dedicated ICE facilities outside Texas.

Time at all three facilities

Entrepreneur Harpinder Singh Chauhan, 56, spent time at all three facilities during nearly four months as a detainee, beginning in February. 

The British national, who first entered the country on an E-2 investor visa in 2016, opened small businesses in Florida. One of them failed ‒ a franchise of Dickey’s Barbecue Pit, which also bankrupted many other franchisees. He and his wife were seeking permanent residency through a valid EB-5 visa petition when their business collapsed.

While Chauhan was never convicted of crimes, he was ordered to pay restitution to Florida for tax issues, court records show. In February, he was turned over to ICE after a routine probation check-in.

At the Krome facility, he spent days in cold, crowded processing cells without beds or showers. He said he was denied medical care, including insulin for his diabetes and an inhaler for his asthma. He used his shoes as a pillow. 

During a tuberculosis outbreak, he said the facility had no soap. Instead, staff made detainees use shampoo to wash their hands. Detainees jokingly said everyone had “Krome’s disease,” a play on Chrohn’s disease, a chronic gastrointestinal illness, Chauhan recalled.

Detainees were beaten for protesting their treatment, and one man was hogtied, the report said. Officials also used solitary confinement as punishment, according to women who spoke to Human Rights Watch. In June, detainees at Krome signaled “SOS” to news cameras from the yard over conditions.

The report said women were placed at Krome, a privately operated men’s facility, where they were crowded in small holding cells without gender-appropriate care or privacy. USA TODAY reported on similar conditions inside Krome, where one man died ‒ an incident Human Rights Watch suspects may have been linked to medical neglect.

Akima, a private Alaska Native Corporation that operates Krome, didn’t respond to USA TODAY’s request for comment. But in response to a Human Rights Watch letter summarizing findings and questions, the company said it couldn’t comment publicly on the specifics of its “engagement” with the government, according to the report.

‘Like a dog’

Midway through his detention, on April 15, Chauhan was placed inside a crowded Federal Detention Center holding cell awaiting transfer without a meal for the day. Styrofoam food containers sat full for hours on other side of the federal prison’s bars.

In the evening, he and others finally received food. But with their hands shackled at their waist, they were forced to eat by putting their faces to bite into potatoes rolling around, rice and dry chicken, he said.

“You’ve got to kind of prop it up with your knees and then eat out of it like a dog,” Chauhan said. Another 21-year-old detainee interviewed by Human Rights Watch also described being forced to eat like an animal.

The 25 to 30 men forced to eat this way were transferred from the facility several hours later, Chauhan said.

Less than a week later, at Broward, Chauhan collapsed in the heat awaiting dinner and was taken to a hospital, with no information given to his family. He had not had his insulin for nearly a week. A 44-year-old Haitian woman, Marie Ange Blaise, died at the facility in April, following a medical emergency that was not treated urgently, according to Human Rights Watch and advocates.

“We strongly believe her death could have been prevented,” Guerline Jozef, director of the nonprofit Haitian Bridge Alliance told USA TODAY at the time. “We will continue to demand accountability and protection for people in ICE custody.”

GEO Group, which operates Broward, denied the report’s allegations, including questions about Chauhan’s account.

The facility has around-the-clock access to medical care, as well as access to visitations, libraries, translation services and amenities, Christopher Ferreira, a spokesperson for the company, said in a statement. Support services are monitored by ICE, including on-site personnel, and other organizations within DHS.

A ‘dark time’ in US

Chauhan was ordered deported and boarded a flight back to the United Kingdom on June 5. His family, including two adult children, stayed in Florida to close what remains of their businesses.

Now living outside London, Chauhan said he plans to keep paying his Florida debt. Even though his family is ready to leave, he hopes to one day return to America.

“Every nation goes through a dark time,” he said. “I feel this is just a test.”

Immigrants forced to eat ‘like a dog’ in ‘overcrowded and chaotic’ detention centers
A Human Rights Watch report said three Miami detention facilities subject people to inhumane, at times life-threatening, conditions.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2025/07/24/trump-immigration-detention-conditions-dog/85338970007

Alternet: ‘Really corrupt’: Church accuses Trump administration of committing ‘domestic terrorism’

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Delegates at the United Church of Christ’s (UCC) 35th General Synod overwhelmingly passed an emergency resolution this week, condemning the ongoing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids as “domestic terrorism” and accusing President Donald Trump’s administration of “weaponizing the Constitution.”

Religious News Service reported Tuesday that the resolution targets immigration enforcement operations “carried out by ICE agents working without uniforms, wearing masks or refusing to identify themselves,” condemning these tactics as threatening and abusive.

Titled “Responding to the federal government’s attack on immigrants, migrants, and refugees,” the resolution urges the church to divest from for-profit private detention firms, specifically naming CoreCivic, GEO Group, and Management and Training Corp.— while allowing congregations to go further if they choose, according to the report.

Presented as an emergency motion by the Rev. Clara Sims of First Congregational UCC in Albuquerque on behalf of the Southwest Conference, the move reflects the church’s urgent response to escalated immigration enforcement under the Trump administration.

Meanwhile, First Congregational UCC has opened housing and provided food and aid to immigrants arriving from the border, actions its minister says stem from the denomination’s theological commitment to protect the vulnerable.

“Our faith has always called us into spaces of risk on behalf of the vulnerable,” said Sims, “especially when people are being made vulnerable by really corrupt systems of power.”

The Southwest Conference fast-tracked the resolution after national church leaders and regional partners voiced deep concerns about human rights violations in detention facilities, per the report.

Last month, Bishop Alberto Rojas of the Diocese of San Bernardino, California, released a letter addressing recent reports that ICE agents had entered Catholic churches.

As head of the sixth-largest Catholic diocese in the U.S., Bishop Rojas strongly criticized the escalation of ICE operations.

In his communication to Catholics, he highlighted that “authorities are now seizing brothers and sisters indiscriminately, without respect for their right to due process and their dignity as children of God.”

He conveyed his solidarity with immigrants “who are bearing the trauma and injustice of these tactics,” and assured them that “we join you in carrying this very difficult cross.”

‘Really corrupt’: Church accuses Trump administration of committing ‘domestic terrorism’

https://www.alternet.org/trump-immigration-ice

Guardian: Irish tourist jailed by Ice for months after overstaying US visit by three days: ‘Nobody is safe’

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Exclusive: For roughly 100 days, Thomas says he faced harsh detention conditions, despite agreeing to deportation

Thomas, a 35-year-old tech worker and father of three from Ireland, came to West Virginia to visit his girlfriend last fall. It was one of many trips he had taken to the US, and he was authorized to travel under a visa waiver program that allows tourists to stay in the country for 90 days.

He had planned to return to Ireland in December, but was briefly unable to fly due to a health issue, his medical records show. He was only three days overdue to leave the US when an encounter with police landed him in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) custody.

From there, what should have been a minor incident became a nightmarish ordeal: he was detained by Ice in three different facilities, ultimately spending roughly 100 days behind bars with little understanding of why he was being held – or when he’d get out.

Farm worker who died after California Ice raid was ‘hardworking and innocent’, family saysRead more

“Nobody is safe from the system if they get pulled into it,” said Thomas, in a recent interview from his home in Ireland, a few months after his release. Thomas asked to be identified by a nickname out of fear of facing further consequences with US immigration authorities.

Despite immediately agreeing to deportation when he was first arrested, Thomas remained in Ice detention after Donald Trump took office and dramatically ramped up immigration arrests. Amid increased overcrowding in detention, Thomas was forced to spend part of his time in custody in a federal prison for criminal defendants, even though he was being held on an immigration violation.

Thomas was sent back to Ireland in March and was told he was banned from entering the US for 10 years.

Thomas’s ordeal follows a rise in reports of tourists and visitors with valid visas being detained by Ice, including from Australia, Germany, Canada and the UK. In April, an Irish woman who is a US green card holder was also detained by Ice for 17 days due to a nearly two-decade-old criminal record.

The arrests appear to be part of a broader crackdown by the Trump administration, which has pushed to deport students with alleged ties to pro-Palestinian protests; sent detainees to Guantánamo Bay and an El Salvador prison without presenting evidence of criminality; deported people to South Sudan, a war-torn country where the deportees had no ties; and escalated large-scale, militarized raids across the US.

‘I thought I was going home’

In an exclusive interview with the Guardian, Thomas detailed his ordeal and the brutal conditions he witnessed in detention that advocates say have long plagued undocumented people and become worse under Trump.

Thomas, an engineer at a tech firm, had never had any problems visiting the US under the visa waiver program. He had initially planned to return home in October, but badly tore his calf, suffered severe swelling and was having trouble walking, he said. A doctor ordered him not to travel for eight to 12 weeks due to the risk of blood clots, which, he said, meant he had to stay slightly past 8 December, when his authorization expired.

He obtained paperwork from his physician and contacted the Irish and US embassies and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to seek an extension, but it was short notice and he did not hear back, he said.

“I did everything I could with the online tools available to notify the authorities that this was happening,” he said, explaining that by the time his deadline to leave the US had approached, he was nearly healed and planning to soon return. “I thought they would understand because I had the correct paperwork. It was just a couple of days for medical reasons.”

He might have avoided immigration consequences, if it weren’t for an ill-timed law enforcement encounter.

Thomas and his girlfriend, Malone, were visiting her family in Savannah, Georgia, when Thomas suffered a mental health episode, he and Malone recalled. The two had a conflict in their hotel room and someone overheard it and called the police, they said.

Malone, who requested to use her middle name to protect her boyfriend’s identity, said she was hoping officers would get him treatment and did not want to see him face criminal charges. But police took him to jail, accusing him of “falsely imprisoning” his girlfriend in the hotel room, a charge Malone said she did not support. He was soon released on bond, but instead of walking free, was picked up by US immigration authorities, who transported him 100 miles away to an Ice processing center in Folkston, Georgia. The facility is operated by the private prison company Geo Group on behalf of Ice, with capacity to hold more than 1,000 people.

Thomas was given a two-page removal order, which said he had remained in the US three days past his authorization and contained no further allegations. On 17 December, he signed a form agreeing to be removed.

But despite signing the form he remained at Folkston, unable to get answers about why Ice wasn’t deporting him or how long he would remain in custody. David Cheng, an attorney who represented Thomas, said he requested that Ice release him with an agreement that he’d return to Ireland as planned, but Ice refused.

At one point at Folkston, after a fight broke out, officers placed detainees on lockdown for about five days, cutting them off from contacting their families, he said. Thomas said he and others only got approximately one hour of outdoor time each week.

In mid-February, after about two months in detention, officers placed him and nearly 50 other detainees in a holding cell, preparing to move them, he said: “I thought I was finally going home.” He called his family to tell them the news.

Instead, he and the others were shackled around their wrists, waists and legs and transported four hours to a federal correctional institution in Atlanta, a prison run by the US Bureau of Prisons (BoP), he said.

BoP houses criminal defendants on federal charges, but the Trump administration, as part of its efforts to expand Ice detention, has been increasingly placing immigrants into BoP facilities – a move that advocates say has led to chaos, overcrowding and violations of detainees’ rights.

‘We were treated less than human’

Thomas said the conditions and treatment by BoP were worse than Ice detention: “They were not prepared for us whatsoever.”

He and other detainees were placed in an area with dirty mattresses, cockroaches and mice, where some bunkbeds lacked ladders, forcing people to climb to the top bed, he said.

BoP didn’t seem to have enough clothes, said Thomas, who got a jumpsuit but no shirt. The facility also gave him a pair of used, ripped underwear with brown stains. Some jumpsuits appeared to have bloodstains and holes, he added.

Each detainee was given one toilet paper roll a week. He shared a cell with another detainee, and he said they were only able to flush the toilet three times an hour. He was often freezing and was given only a thin blanket. The food was “disgusting slop”, including some kind of mysterious meat that at times appeared to have chunks of bones and other inedible items mixed in, he said. He was frequently hungry.

“The staff didn’t know why we were there and they were treating us exactly as they would treat BoP prisoners, and they told us that,” Thomas said. “We were treated less than human.”

He and others requested medical visits, but were never seen by physicians, he said: “I heard people crying for doctors, saying they couldn’t breathe, and staff would just say, ‘Well, I’m not a doctor,’ and walk away.” He did eventually receive the psychiatric medication he requested, but staff would throw his pill under his cell door, and he’d sometimes have to search the floor to find it.

Detainees, he said, were given recreation time in an enclosure that was partially open to fresh air, but resembled an indoor cage: “You couldn’t see the outside whatsoever. I didn’t see the sky for weeks.” He had sciatica from an earlier hip injury and said he began experiencing “unbearable” nerve pain as a result of the lack of movement.

Thomas said it seemed Ice’s placements in the BoP facility were arbitrary and poorly planned. Of the nearly 50 people taken from Ice to BoP facility, about 30 of them were transferred back to Folkston a week later, and the following week, two from that group were once again returned to the BoP facility, he said.

In the BoP facility, he said, Ice representatives would show up once a week to talk to detainees. Detainees would crowd around Ice officials and beg for case updates or help. Ice officers spoke Spanish and English, but Middle Eastern and North African detainees who spoke neither were stuck in a state on confusion. “It was pandemonium,” Thomas said.

Thomas said he saw a BoP guard tear up “watching the desperation of the people trying to talk to Ice and find out what was happening”, and that this officer tried to assist people as best as she could. Thomas and Malone tried to help asylum seekers and others he met at the BoP facility by connecting them to advocates.

Thomas was also unable to speak to his children, because there was no way to make international calls. “I don’t know how I made it through,” he said.

In mid-March, Thomas was briefly transferred again to a different Ice facility. The authorities did not explain what had changed, but two armed federal officers then escorted him on a flight back to Ireland.

The DHS and Ice did not respond to inquiries, and a spokesperson for the Geo Group declined to comment.

Donald Murphy, a BoP spokesperson, confirmed that Thomas had been in the bureau’s custody, but did not comment about his case or conditions at the Atlanta facility. The BoP is now housing Ice detainees in eight of its prisons and would “continue to support our law enforcement partners to fulfill the administration’s policy objectives”, Murphy added.

‘This will be a lifelong burden’

It’s unclear why Thomas was jailed for so long for a minor immigration violation.

“It seems completely outlandish that they would detain someone for three months because he overstayed a visa for a medical reason,” said Sirine Shebaya, executive director of the National Immigration Project, who is not involved in his case and was provided a summary by the Guardian. “It is such a waste of time and money at a time when we’re hearing constantly about how the government wants to cut expenses. It seems like a completely incomprehensible, punitive detention.”

Ice, she added, was “creating its own crisis of overcrowding”.

Jennifer Ibañez Whitlock, senior policy counsel with the National Immigration Law Center, also not involved in the case, said, in general, it was not uncommon for someone to remain in immigration custody even after they’ve accepted a removal order and that she has had European clients shocked to learn they can face serious consequences for briefly overstaying a visa.

Ice, however, had discretion to release Thomas with an agreement that he’d return home instead of keeping him indefinitely detained, she said. The Trump administration, she added, has defaulted to keeping people detained without weighing individual factors of their cases: “Now it’s just, do we have a bed?”

Republican lawmakers in Georgia last year also passed state legislation requiring police to alert immigration authorities when an undocumented person is arrested, which could have played a role in Thomas being flagged to Ice, said Samantha Hamilton, staff attorney with Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Atlanta, a non-profit group that advocates for immigrants’ rights. She met Thomas on a legal visit at the BoP Atlanta facility.

Hamilton said she was particularly concerned about immigrants of color who are racially profiled and pulled over by police, but Thomas’s ordeal was a reminder that so many people are vulnerable. “The mass detentions are terrifying and it makes me afraid for everyone,” she said.

Thomas had previously traveled to the US frequently for work, but now questions if he’ll ever be allowed to return. “This will be a lifelong burden,” he said.

Malone, his girlfriend, said she plans to move to Ireland to live with him. “It’s not an option for him to come here and I don’t want to be in America anymore,” she said.

Since his return, Thomas said he has had a hard time sleeping and processing what happened: “I’ll never forget it, and it’ll be a long time before I’ll be able to even start to unpack everything I went through. It still doesn’t feel real. When I think about it, it’s like a movie I’m watching.” He said he has also struggled with long-term health problems that he attributes to malnutrition and inappropriate medications he was given while detained.

He was shaken by reports of people sent away without due process. “I wouldn’t have been surprised if I ended up at Guantánamo Bay or El Salvador, because it was so disorganized,” he said. “I was just at the mercy of the federal government.”

Irish tourist jailed by Ice for months after overstaying US visit by three days: ‘Nobody is safe’
Exclusive: For roughly 100 days, Thomas says he faced harsh detention conditions, despite agreeing to deportation

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jul/15/irish-tourist-ice-detention

NBC News: Immigrants in overcapacity ICE detention say they’re hungry, raise food quality concerns

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As the Trump administration ramps up immigration arrests, recent detainees and advocacy groups are raising concerns about food in ICE facilities nationwide.

Immigrants being held in Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention centers in at least seven states are complaining of hunger, food shortages and spoiled food, detainees and immigration advocates say. They say some detainees have gotten sick; others say they have lost weight. In one facility, an incident involving detainees reportedly broke out in part because of food.

The food problems come amid overcrowding at ICE facilities tied to the Trump administration’s push to quickly ramp up immigration arrests. While capacity data isn’t publicly available for every ICE detention facility, nationwide figures on the availability of beds show a system beyond its overall capacity. As of mid-June, ICE was detaining nearly 60,000 people, almost 45% above the capacity provided for by Congress.

Although many of ICE’s detention centers are run by private contractors, the problems are happening all over the country regardless of who’s running a given facility, advocates say. A former ICE official told NBC News it is difficult for a facility to stay stocked with the right amount of food when, on any given day, it may face an unexpected surge of new detainees. While the agency can move money around to cover the cost of detaining more immigrants, planning for unexpected daily spikes can be difficult for facilities and could lead to food being served late or in small quantities, the former ICE official said.

On top of that, there are now fewer avenues for detainees to submit concerns while they are in ICE custody, advocates say, pointing to recent job cuts to an independent watchdog within the Department of Homeland Security, ICE’s parent agency.

“We haven’t seen any company-specific trends,” said Vanessa Dojaquez-Torres, practice and policy counsel with the American Immigration Lawyers Association. “It just goes to the overall detention system and how overcrowded the detention system is as a whole.”

Alfredo Parada Calderon, a Salvadoran man who has been detained for almost a year, says he has recently had meals that have left him feeling hungry.

Detainees have sometimes been given flavorless meat that is so finely ground that it is almost liquefied, he told NBC News from the Golden State Annex detention facility in California.

“It looks like little, small pebbles, and that will be the ounces that they give you,” he said, referring to meat portions he has had in meals.

Jennifer Norris, a directing attorney at the Immigrant Defenders Law Center with clients at multiple California detention centers, said it has gotten several complaints from clients in other facilities about the food being “inedible” and in one case “moldy.” The complaints come as some centers reach capacity with recent arrests, she said.

A woman named Rubimar, who asked that she and her husband, Jose, be identified by their first names only because he was deported Wednesday and fears fallout in Venezuela as a result of talking to the media, said Jose was detained by ICE in El Paso, Texas, for about three months and had complained about a lack of food there.

“He tells me many are given two spoonfuls of rice and that many are still hungry,” Rubimar said in an interview before Jose was deported to Venezuela.

Russian immigrant detainee Ilia Chernov said the conditions, including food, have gotten worse since he was detained at the Winn Correctional Center in Louisiana on July 24, 2024.

“The portions got smaller,” Chernov said through a Russian translator. “I have to deal with hunger, so I am getting used to the hunger. So I have lost weight.”

DHS said Winn Correctional Center has received no complaints from Russian detainees. However, Chernov’s lawyers said he has submitted complaints about food to ICE in writing, at least one as recently as April.

The detainees’ complaints are consistent with what advocates say they are hearing from other detainees and their lawyers across the country.

Liliana Chumpitasi, who runs a hotline for detainees at the immigration advocacy group La Resistencia in Washington state, said she gets 10 to 20 calls a day from ICE detainees complaining about conditions. They have told her that the meals used to be delivered on a regular schedule, such as 6 a.m. for breakfast and noon for lunch, but that now breakfast may not come until 9 a.m. and dinner is often not served until midnight. Some detainees have also said meals are now half the size they were last year, she said.

According to ICE’s food service standards, detainees are required to be served three meals a day, two of which are supposed to be hot, and with “no more than 14 hours between the evening meal and breakfast.”

Congress has funded ICE to detain up to 41,500 people, including facilities, food, staffing and supplies. But as of the week of July 7, ICE had over 57,000 detainees in its facilities across the country, according to ICE data. However, there is an expectation that more space will be added with the passage this month of President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill,” which allocates $45 billion for ICE detention centers until the end of September 2029. According to an estimate by the American Immigration Council, that amount could “likely fund an increase in ICE detention to at least 116,000 beds” per year.

Two other former ICE officials said the agency can hold more people than Congress has funded it for but only for short periods. A current senior ICE official, who asked not to be named to freely discuss ongoing funding issues, said the agency has pulled money from other parts of DHS to continue funding detention through Sept. 30.

Asked about specific allegations of food scarcity and substandard food, DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin told NBC News in a statement, “Any claim that there is lack of food or subprime conditions at ICE detention centers are false.”

“All detainees are provided with proper meals, medical treatment and have opportunity to communicate with their family members and lawyers,” McLaughlin said. “Meals are certified by dieticians. Ensuring the safety, security and well-being of individuals in our custody is a top priority at ICE.”

‘Improper food handling practices’

In Tacoma, Washington, at the Northwest ICE Processing Center, Chumpitasi fears the increase in people being held there has contributed to poor food safety.

Seven food violations have been found there in 2025 so far, compared with two in 2024 and one in 2023, according to inspection data by the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department. According to ICE data, 1,081 people were detained there as of June 23, compared with 719 at the end of fiscal year 2024 and 570 at the end of fiscal year 2023. (The federal government’s fiscal year runs through Sept. 30.)

One morning in mid-April, the facility contacted the local Health Department to report 57 cases of suspected foodborne illness, with symptoms including diarrhea, stomachache and bloating, according to the Health Department. After an investigation, the department concluded that reheated collard greens that had been served at the facility had tested positive for Bacillus cereus, a bacterium that can cause food poisoning. The collard greens were a substitute food for that day and not posted on the day’s menu, according to health department documents. Food poisoning caused by Bacillus cereus is often related to leftover food that has been improperly cooled or reheated.

The Health Department went back to the Northwest Processing Center for an unannounced visit and found “several improper food handling practices.” It worked with the staff there to correct them, and as of June 18 the facility had passed inspection.

Asked about that, McLaughlin said in an email, “While the Health Department was notified, the on-site medical team concluded that there was no evidence linking the illness to a specific food item, as claimed by the detainees.”

‘I am getting used to the hunger’

Over the past month, the American Immigration Lawyers Association has received at least a dozen food-related complaints from advocacy groups and lawyers representing detainees across the country, according to Dojaquez-Torres.

“The common complaint is that there is just not enough food,” she said in an interview. “What I am hearing is that there are extended periods of time when people are not being fed, and when they are, they are being given chips or a slice of bread.”

“We have been getting reports from around the country from our members … and conditions have been declining rapidly,” she said. She also said that some detainees haven’t been given beds and that some have said they aren’t given access to showers.

In early June, a “melee” broke out in Delaney Hall in Newark, New Jersey, because of conditions inside the facility, which included “paltry meals served at irregular hours,” according to The New York Times, which spoke to several lawyers representing detainees inside the facility and family members.

Geo Group pushed back against the Times’ reporting in an emailed statement at the time, saying, “Contrary to current reporting, there has been no widespread unrest at the facility.”

DHS also denied allegations of food issues at the Newark immigration detention facility when NBC News asked about them.

“Allegations that there are chronic food shortages at Delaney Hall are unequivocally false. The facility regularly reviews any detainee complaints. The Food Service Operations Director conducted a review of food portions and detainees are being fed the portions as prescribed by the nutritionist, based on a daily 2400 to 2600 caloric intake,” McLaughlin said.

DHS didn’t respond to a follow-up question about how recently the food service operations director — or any oversight body reviewing food in ICE detention facilities nationwide — had last visited and made an assessment.

In late May, Rubimar said, her husband, Jose, had called and told her that the gas at his facility wasn’t functioning and that they had been given only a bag of tuna to eat in the meantime. But even before that, she said, her husband said the food was “too little.”

McLaughlin said a dietitian had recently approved the meal plan at the El Paso Service Processing Center and indicated “the total caloric intake for ICE detainees at the facility was 3,436 per day — which exceeds the average daily recommended minimums.”

LaSalle Corrections, which operates the Winn Correctional Center, didn’t respond to requests for comment.

The GEO Group, which operates the ICE facilities in Newark and Tacoma, as well as the Golden State Annex and many others nationwide, didn’t respond to specific allegations about food service and instead provided this statement: “We are proud of the role our company has played for 40 years to support the law enforcement mission of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Over the last four decades, our innovative support service solutions have helped the federal government implement the policies of seven different Presidential Administrations. In all instances, our support services are monitored by ICE, including on-site agency personnel, and other organizations within the Department of Homeland Security to ensure strict compliance with ICE detention standards.”

Reduced oversight

Beyond overcrowding, immigration advocates also blame the alleged food issues at detention facilities in part on cutbacks to a team of inspectors inside DHS.

The Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman, an office that previously oversaw conditions inside ICE and ICE-contracted facilities, was entirely or mainly shuttered this year after the “majority of the workforce” was issued reduction-in-force notices, according to ongoing litigation regarding the cuts.

“One of the things that made the [Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman] is that we actually had case managers in the facilities and they were accessible to the detainees,” a former DHS employee who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of concerns about future government employment. “They would actually go into the kitchen [to see] if there were deficiencies and work with kitchen management.”

Karla Gilbride, a lawyer with Public Citizen, a nonprofit advocacy group suing the Trump administration over the firings of people in the office, said the office has been completely dismantled.

“That is our position, that they have shut down the office. They put everyone on leave. They were told to stop interacting with everyone who filed complaints” from detention, Gilbride said.

The former DHS employee said the dismantling of the ombudsman’s office means detainees have fewer options if they have complaints or concerns about things like food, overcrowding, sanitation, access to legal counsel and clean clothes.

“At the end of the day, it really just means that there are less people to sound an alarm,” the former DHS employee said.

McLaughlin didn’t respond to requests for comment about the dismantling of the ombudsman’s office. DHS has maintained in court filings that the ombudsman’s office remains open and that efforts to restaff certain positions affected by the layoffs are underway.

In a status report filed in court in early July, government lawyers said they are onboarding three new employees at the ombudsman’s office and that files have been created for all new complaints since the end of March.

There have been way too many of these complaints about insuffieient and low quality food at the ICE detention centers. Outside investigation (international Red Cross?) is needed.

Immigrants in overcapacity ICE detention say they’re hungry, raise food quality concerns
As the Trump administration ramps up immigration arrests, recent detainees and advocacy groups are raising concerns about food in ICE facilities nationwide.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/immigrants-overcapacity-ice-detention-say-hungry-raise-food-quality-co-rcna214193

Immigrants in overcapacity ICE detention say they’re hungry, raise food quality concerns

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As the Trump administration ramps up immigration arrests, recent detainees and advocacy groups are raising concerns about food in ICE facilities nationwide.

Immigrants being held in Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention centers in at least seven states are complaining of hunger, food shortages and spoiled food, detainees and immigration advocates say. They say some detainees have gotten sick; others say they have lost weight. In one facility, an incident involving detainees reportedly broke out in part because of food.

The food problems come amid overcrowding at ICE facilities tied to the Trump administration’s push to quickly ramp up immigration arrests. While capacity data isn’t publicly available for every ICE detention facility, nationwide figures on the availability of beds show a system beyond its overall capacity. As of mid-June, ICE was detaining nearly 60,000 people, almost 45% above the capacity provided for by Congress.

Although many of ICE’s detention centers are run by private contractors, the problems are happening all over the country regardless of who’s running a given facility, advocates say. A former ICE official told NBC News it is difficult for a facility to stay stocked with the right amount of food when, on any given day, it may face an unexpected surge of new detainees. While the agency can move money around to cover the cost of detaining more immigrants, planning for unexpected daily spikes can be difficult for facilities and could lead to food being served late or in small quantities, the former ICE official said.

On top of that, there are now fewer avenues for detainees to submit concerns while they are in ICE custody, advocates say, pointing to recent job cuts to an independent watchdog within the Department of Homeland Security, ICE’s parent agency.

“We haven’t seen any company-specific trends,” said Vanessa Dojaquez-Torres, practice and policy counsel with the American Immigration Lawyers Association. “It just goes to the overall detention system and how overcrowded the detention system is as a whole.”

Alfredo Parada Calderon, a Salvadoran man who has been detained for almost a year, says he has recently had meals that have left him feeling hungry.

Detainees have sometimes been given flavorless meat that is so finely ground that it is almost liquefied, he told NBC News from the Golden State Annex detention facility in California.

“It looks like little, small pebbles, and that will be the ounces that they give you,” he said, referring to meat portions he has had in meals.

Jennifer Norris, a directing attorney at the Immigrant Defenders Law Center with clients at multiple California detention centers, said it has gotten several complaints from clients in other facilities about the food being “inedible” and in one case “moldy.” The complaints come as some centers reach capacity with recent arrests, she said.

A woman named Rubimar, who asked that she and her husband, Jose, be identified by their first names only because he was deported Wednesday and fears fallout in Venezuela as a result of talking to the media, said Jose was detained by ICE in El Paso, Texas, for about three months and had complained about a lack of food there.

“He tells me many are given two spoonfuls of rice and that many are still hungry,” Rubimar said in an interview before Jose was deported to Venezuela.

Russian immigrant detainee Ilia Chernov said the conditions, including food, have gotten worse since he was detained at the Winn Correctional Center in Louisiana on July 24, 2024.

“The portions got smaller,” Chernov said through a Russian translator. “I have to deal with hunger, so I am getting used to the hunger. So I have lost weight.”

DHS said Winn Correctional Center has received no complaints from Russian detainees. However, Chernov’s lawyers said he has submitted complaints about food to ICE in writing, at least one as recently as April.

The detainees’ complaints are consistent with what advocates say they are hearing from other detainees and their lawyers across the country.

Liliana Chumpitasi, who runs a hotline for detainees at the immigration advocacy group La Resistencia in Washington state, said she gets 10 to 20 calls a day from ICE detainees complaining about conditions. They have told her that the meals used to be delivered on a regular schedule, such as 6 a.m. for breakfast and noon for lunch, but that now breakfast may not come until 9 a.m. and dinner is often not served until midnight. Some detainees have also said meals are now half the size they were last year, she said.

According to ICE’s food service standards, detainees are required to be served three meals a day, two of which are supposed to be hot, and with “no more than 14 hours between the evening meal and breakfast.”

Congress has funded ICE to detain up to 41,500 people, including facilities, food, staffing and supplies. But as of the week of July 7, ICE had over 57,000 detainees in its facilities across the country, according to ICE data. However, there is an expectation that more space will be added with the passage this month of President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill,” which allocates $45 billion for ICE detention centers until the end of September 2029. According to an estimate by the American Immigration Council, that amount could “likely fund an increase in ICE detention to at least 116,000 beds” per year.

Two other former ICE officials said the agency can hold more people than Congress has funded it for but only for short periods. A current senior ICE official, who asked not to be named to freely discuss ongoing funding issues, said the agency has pulled money from other parts of DHS to continue funding detention through Sept. 30.

Asked about specific allegations of food scarcity and substandard food, DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin told NBC News in a statement, “Any claim that there is lack of food or subprime conditions at ICE detention centers are false.”

“All detainees are provided with proper meals, medical treatment and have opportunity to communicate with their family members and lawyers,” McLaughlin said. “Meals are certified by dieticians. Ensuring the safety, security and well-being of individuals in our custody is a top priority at ICE.”

‘Improper food handling practices’

In Tacoma, Washington, at the Northwest ICE Processing Center, Chumpitasi fears the increase in people being held there has contributed to poor food safety.

Seven food violations have been found there in 2025 so far, compared with two in 2024 and one in 2023, according to inspection data by the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department. According to ICE data, 1,081 people were detained there as of June 23, compared with 719 at the end of fiscal year 2024 and 570 at the end of fiscal year 2023. (The federal government’s fiscal year runs through Sept. 30.)

One morning in mid-April, the facility contacted the local Health Department to report 57 cases of suspected foodborne illness, with symptoms including diarrhea, stomachache and bloating, according to the Health Department. After an investigation, the department concluded that reheated collard greens that had been served at the facility had tested positive for Bacillus cereus, a bacterium that can cause food poisoning. The collard greens were a substitute food for that day and not posted on the day’s menu, according to health department documents. Food poisoning caused by Bacillus cereus is often related to leftover food that has been improperly cooled or reheated.

The Health Department went back to the Northwest Processing Center for an unannounced visit and found “several improper food handling practices.” It worked with the staff there to correct them, and as of June 18 the facility had passed inspection.

Asked about that, McLaughlin said in an email, “While the Health Department was notified, the on-site medical team concluded that there was no evidence linking the illness to a specific food item, as claimed by the detainees.”

‘I am getting used to the hunger’

Over the past month, the American Immigration Lawyers Association has received at least a dozen food-related complaints from advocacy groups and lawyers representing detainees across the country, according to Dojaquez-Torres.

“The common complaint is that there is just not enough food,” she said in an interview. “What I am hearing is that there are extended periods of time when people are not being fed, and when they are, they are being given chips or a slice of bread.”

“We have been getting reports from around the country from our members … and conditions have been declining rapidly,” she said. She also said that some detainees haven’t been given beds and that some have said they aren’t given access to showers.

In early June, a “melee” broke out in Delaney Hall in Newark, New Jersey, because of conditions inside the facility, which included “paltry meals served at irregular hours,” according to The New York Times, which spoke to several lawyers representing detainees inside the facility and family members.

Geo Group pushed back against the Times’ reporting in an emailed statement at the time, saying, “Contrary to current reporting, there has been no widespread unrest at the facility.”

DHS also denied allegations of food issues at the Newark immigration detention facility when NBC News asked about them.

“Allegations that there are chronic food shortages at Delaney Hall are unequivocally false. The facility regularly reviews any detainee complaints. The Food Service Operations Director conducted a review of food portions and detainees are being fed the portions as prescribed by the nutritionist, based on a daily 2400 to 2600 caloric intake,” McLaughlin said.

DHS didn’t respond to a follow-up question about how recently the food service operations director — or any oversight body reviewing food in ICE detention facilities nationwide — had last visited and made an assessment.

In late May, Rubimar said, her husband, Jose, had called and told her that the gas at his facility wasn’t functioning and that they had been given only a bag of tuna to eat in the meantime. But even before that, she said, her husband said the food was “too little.”

McLaughlin said a dietitian had recently approved the meal plan at the El Paso Service Processing Center and indicated “the total caloric intake for ICE detainees at the facility was 3,436 per day — which exceeds the average daily recommended minimums.”

LaSalle Corrections, which operates the Winn Correctional Center, didn’t respond to requests for comment.

The GEO Group, which operates the ICE facilities in Newark and Tacoma, as well as the Golden State Annex and many others nationwide, didn’t respond to specific allegations about food service and instead provided this statement: “We are proud of the role our company has played for 40 years to support the law enforcement mission of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Over the last four decades, our innovative support service solutions have helped the federal government implement the policies of seven different Presidential Administrations. In all instances, our support services are monitored by ICE, including on-site agency personnel, and other organizations within the Department of Homeland Security to ensure strict compliance with ICE detention standards.”

Reduced oversight

Beyond overcrowding, immigration advocates also blame the alleged food issues at detention facilities in part on cutbacks to a team of inspectors inside DHS.

The Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman, an office that previously oversaw conditions inside ICE and ICE-contracted facilities, was entirely or mainly shuttered this year after the “majority of the workforce” was issued reduction-in-force notices, according to ongoing litigation regarding the cuts.

“One of the things that made the [Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman] is that we actually had case managers in the facilities and they were accessible to the detainees,” a former DHS employee who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of concerns about future government employment. “They would actually go into the kitchen [to see] if there were deficiencies and work with kitchen management.”

Karla Gilbride, a lawyer with Public Citizen, a nonprofit advocacy group suing the Trump administration over the firings of people in the office, said the office has been completely dismantled.

“That is our position, that they have shut down the office. They put everyone on leave. They were told to stop interacting with everyone who filed complaints” from detention, Gilbride said.

The former DHS employee said the dismantling of the ombudsman’s office means detainees have fewer options if they have complaints or concerns about things like food, overcrowding, sanitation, access to legal counsel and clean clothes.

“At the end of the day, it really just means that there are less people to sound an alarm,” the former DHS employee said.

McLaughlin didn’t respond to requests for comment about the dismantling of the ombudsman’s office. DHS has maintained in court filings that the ombudsman’s office remains open and that efforts to restaff certain positions affected by the layoffs are underway.

In a status report filed in court in early July, government lawyers said they are onboarding three new employees at the ombudsman’s office and that files have been created for all new complaints since the end of March.

Immigrants in overcapacity ICE detention say they’re hungry, raise food quality concerns
As the Trump administration ramps up immigration arrests, recent detainees and advocacy groups are raising concerns about food in ICE facilities nationwide.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/immigrants-overcapacity-ice-detention-say-hungry-raise-food-quality-co-rcna214193

ACLU Alaska: ICE detainee held at Anchorage jail in June is hospitalized with tuberculosis

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An Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detainee held during June at an Alaska Department of Corrections (DOC) facility has been hospitalized in Tacoma, Washington, with tuberculosis. The 35 individuals held at Anchorage Correctional Complex (ACC) were informed by ICE upon their return to Tacoma on June 30th that they were exposed to tuberculosis while detained in Alaska.  

Tuberculosis is a serious and highly contagious disease that mainly affects the lungs. Alaska has the highest rate of tuberculosis in the country.  

The hospitalization was uncovered by the detainee’s attorney, Sean Quirk, whose client missed two scheduled video appointments from the Tacoma ICE detention facility. Quirk was only able to confirm that his client was ill with tuberculosis after calling Tacoma-area hospitals and eventually locating his client. However, an officer from the GEO Group, the private prison company that runs the Tacoma facility, denied him access to speak with his client. The client is still hospitalized and being treated for tuberculosis.  

ACLU of Alaska attorneys were also informed by two ICE detainees during their detention at ACC that they had tested positive for latent tuberculosis and had undergone additional tuberculosis testing. 

“Whether a detainee is in custody at a prison or at a hospital, it is unacceptable and unconstitutional to deny them access to legal counsel,” said Cindy Woods, Senior Immigration Law and Policy Fellow at the ACLU of Alaska. 

Questions remain whether consistent medical screenings were conducted when detainees arrived at ACC on June 8; if correctional officers or other staff at ACC have been tested for the disease; and if proper reporting to the Alaska Department of Health has been completed. In Alaska, cases of tuberculosis are required to be reported to the State of Alaska Health Department within two days.  

During the state legislative hearing on June 20th, ACLU of Alaska and volunteer attorneys testified that detainees had documented chronic medical issues and were being denied access to care while held at ACC. During the hearing, DOC Commissioner Jennifer Winkleman confirmed that pepper spray was deployed in areas where detainees were being held, causing ongoing respiratory distress for detainees. 

This information comes on the heels of a class-action lawsuit filed by the ACLU of Alaska against DOC in May for failing to provide adequate health care for incarcerated Alaskans. It is unclear if other individuals at ACC have been exposed to or tested for tuberculosis.  

ICE detainee held at Anchorage jail in June is hospitalized with tuberculosis
The hospitalization was uncovered by the detainee’s attorney, who was denied access to his client in Tacoma, Washington.

https://www.acluak.org/en/press-releases/ice-detainee-held-anchorage-jail-june-hospitalized-tuberculosis