J4A Week39: S.O.S.
All ICE Detention Facilities Are Delaney Hall
If you haven’t heard, there is an ongoing hunger strike at a detention center in New Jersey called Delaney Hall. It started May 22 with 300-400 taking part. Most of the reporting I’ve seen has been about what’s happening outside. I wanted to talk about what’s happening inside Delaney and I decided that the simplest way to do that is to read one of their letters, titled S.O.S. (Their letter in italics below, my commentary indented)
S.O.S. A Second Letter from Delaney Hall
[...] we take the liberty of providing an account of the situation that thousands of immigrants are living in detention centers. In this case, we speak directly of DELANEY HALL [...].
Initially, we ask for forgiveness for the way we entered the United States, but given the circumstances we were living in our countries, which placed our lives and those of some members of our families in danger.
At the moment of entry, we turned ourselves in to border authorities, who processed us and some of us were granted “parole” or given a court date to continue with our processes, in accordance with the opportunity granted to us by the Constitution [...]. we had periodic check-ins in order to report to the authorities. We obtained work permits, [paid] Social Security, we filed taxes, and we were working legally [...]. [...] within this group there are individuals who crossed the border, integrated into society, formed families, and have lived in the country for 10 years or more with their citizen children [...] have been paying their taxes and have a clean record.
DHS’ legal theory has been that people they denote as EWI (entered without inspection) are not entitled to bond. The authors claim they were processed by border authorities and then complied with court dates and check-ins.
We find individuals from the LGBTQ+ community with diagnoses of illnesses such as HIV, cancer, diabetes, heart problems, among others, who are not receiving proper medical attention for the aforementioned conditions.
[...] we had already been processed, were complying with legal requirements, and there was no order from a judge for our detention or arrest [...]. However, ICE officers [...] arrested us during check-in appointments at USCIS facilities. Even with credible fear approved, we have been subjected to court proceedings where [...], without reviewing each case individually [...] judges are denying a high number of cases, dismissing them.
The authors are referring to Credible Fear Interviews, a threshold screening conducted by USCIS. It is the basis of starting an asylum claim.
There are days where judges [...] have more than 40 hearings to review and study how due process should be applied, yet within minutes they make final decisions issuing deportations and expulsions. Many hearings are canceled, leaving detainees waiting months for a court date.
If a judge works a full day of 8 hours and handled 40 cases, that would allow 12 minutes per case. Do you suppose that is enough time to devote before deporting someone?
In the same way, prosecutors file motions to send individuals to Latin American countries such as ECUADOR, GUATEMALA, HONDURAS, and even UGANDA in Africa—countries [...] conditions of violence and persecution from which we are fleeing. [...] This has led many people, under pressure, to accept and sign voluntary departure to their countries of origin at the expense of the danger to which we may be exposed.
At an online educational forum Monday night, attorney Robin Nice made the point that “voluntary departure” is an incorrect term. These people don’t want to leave, they are being coerced into leaving.
Last week, I spoke about third country deportations and here you can see how these are used as a coercive threat. Go back to your own country and face the threat you know or you will be sent to some other place, perhaps on another continent.
In these courts, judges inform the detainee that they can purchase a plane ticket to return to their country of origin, but the ICE officer denies that possibility, evidencing contradictions among government officials themselves.
Likewise, there are cases of individuals who already have their voluntary departure signed and deportations approved by judges, waiting 2 or 3 months to be sent to their country of origin.
These are details that I have not heard previously. Why would a judge tell people they could buy a ticket home, only to have ICE say no? Why would someone who signed the voluntary departure have to wait 2-3 months? Don’t forget, there is a corporation with a financial incentive involved in their detention.
I want to tell you about a woman I met here months ago; I’ll call her Maria. She and her parents made a 2-hour drive to Burlington several months ago looking for information on her detained brother and got none. Using the ICE locator database, we found he was listed at a detention center in New England, but Maria said no, he had been there but was no longer. I kept checking and days later his status changed, showing that he had accepted voluntary departure. I informed Maria via text. Days after that, it showed he had been transferred to Mississippi. I informed Maria, at which point, she texted me, “but why, I just brought his passport and a suitcase to Burlington along with a plane ticket home.” That was when I learned that voluntary departure means that you pay your way home. But for Maria’s brother, they decided to transfer him to a Mississippi ICE facility first, making Maria’s 2-hour drive to Burlington and the plane ticket she bought a waste.
We feel vulnerable and, in a way, kidnapped, detained without justification [...] tortured physically and psychologically due to the poor food resources [...]. We see with deep helplessness and frustration that our due process, rights, and defense have been violated, disregarding benefits granted under the 4th, 5th, and 6th Amendments of the UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION.
The 4th amendment prohibits illegal searches and seizures. The 5th guarantees due process. The 6th is your right to a speedy trial, which unfortunately does not apply to immigration hearings, because they are civil proceedings. But it’s a good point, shouldn’t the Constitution guarantee a reasonable period for an immigration hearing?
Families are being destroyed and separated, where there are children [who] have witnessed the arrests of their relatives, who have been struck by tragedy and the economic burden, since in most cases we are heads of household.
It is public knowledge that agents have arrested individuals with physical limitations such as: deaf, mute, blind individuals, elderly persons, and even pregnant women.
We’ve talked about the cases of pregnant women, Djennifer and Candelaria, in Massachusetts. I had never heard of a deaf person being arrested, but a quick search brought me the case of Javier Diaz Santana, a DACA recipient and car wash worker in California, who is deaf and mute. He was denied an American Sign Language interpreter during his detention, which lasted a month. There is a YouTube video where Javier is interviewed by a local TV station.
We see young people with approved juvenile status cases [...]. There is also a high spread of COVID-19 in detention centers, and the flu is constant among detainees, which could lead to outbreaks of illnesses or epidemics.
We are certain that we are not being processed equally under immigration laws and the Constitution. We have seen fellow detainees with residency, U visas, T visas, among other similar cases.
T visas are for victims of human trafficking. U visas are for victims of certain crimes, including blackmail, kidnaping, and sexual assault.
We have seen judges in this detention center who are ready to carry out deportations and mass expulsions without properly reviewing cases. We live with anguish and fear of appearing in court.
We are witnessing how judges are disregarding decisions of federal judges, for example not honoring HABEAS CORPUS rulings decided by a FEDERAL judge, depriving us of our liberty.
Judges [...] accuse us of being a danger to the United States of America or, alternatively, declare that we will flee from immigration agencies, even though they have adequate monitoring tools such as GPS ankle monitors and constant check-ins at immigration offices. There are individuals who have been detained for 5 months or more, who have been denied bond more than once despite having a clean record and an approved HABEAS CORPUS.
Immigrants have won 10,400 Habeas cases (POLITICO). But what is the point of a federal judge granting release if the people are not released?
Our AMERICAN DREAM is the safety and protection of our families. We are in a difficult situation, and we trust in God and believe that justice will be done under the law of the United States of America, since it is a sovereign and constitutional country respected worldwide for upholding human rights.
It sounds to me like the Delaney Hall strikers know more about the Constitution than our federal agencies do, and they may have more faith in America than many citizens.
We sincerely and earnestly ask for help from Senators, Congress members, foundations, and organizations that collaborate with immigrants.
There are exactly 535 people who have the authority to enter any ICE detention center unannounced and conduct oversight, our 435 House representatives and 100 senators.
History of Delaney Hall
Delaney Hall operated as an ICE detention facility from 2011 to 2017. It eventually sat empty for several years. Then on April 2, 2025 the Trump administration signed a contract with the GEO group to reopen Delaney Hall for a period of 15 years. The total value of the contract is $1B and it will earn the GEO Group about $60M in the first year.
After opening last year, Delaney quickly became the main detention center for the New York City region, with the population reaching 1,047 by December. Newark Mayor Ras Baraka was arrested and charged with trespassing last May while trying to conduct oversight.
On Memorial Day this year, governor Mikie Sherrill was denied access and Senator Andy Kim was shot with pepper balls. By the way, pepper balls and tear gas are prohibited as a method of war by the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention, but there is an exception for law enforcement purposes.
That amazes me and I cannot comprehend how substances seen as inhumane on the battlefield are used against civilians.
ICE has denied that there is a hunger strike. In fact, they released a list of what they say is false information about the facility.
“Another day, another hoax about ICE detention facilities. Sanctuary politicians are spreading categorically false smears about ICE’s Delaney Hall facility in New Jersey.” said Acting Assistant Secretary Lauren Bis. “These sanctuary politicians should be thanking ICE law enforcement for removing murderers, rapists, pedophiles, and drug traffickers from their communities. No lawbreakers in the history of human civilization have been better treated than illegal aliens. They are provided 3 meals a day, medical care, and receive full due process.”
Perhaps Bis can explain how Substacker Austin Kocher found that ICE’s data shows that 70.5% of the people detained at Delaney Hall on March 10 have no criminal history?
Another 18% have only pending charges, leaving just 99 people out of 844 that have convictions. Of those, the most serious convictions are 39 traffic offenses like DUI, 11 for illegal entry, 7 for larceny, and a handful of others. There were exactly 0 murderers, rapists, and pedophiles at Delaney Hall on March 10. If it is so chock full of dangerous criminals now, ICE should show us the data. Of course, maybe it’s just BS.
Kocher analyzed the entire population of anyone detained under the current contract by ICE and found just 92 cases out of 10,311 are convicted of serious offenses, just 0.89%.
Lauren Bis also says the people detained have had full due process, but Kocher finds that just 15% of the 844 people in Delaney on March 10 had a final removal order.
Does that sound like due process?
Tom Homan said of the hunger strike, “If it gets bad enough and the prisoners feel like they’re putting themselves in extreme danger, medical danger, then we’ll force-feed them.”
On Memorial Day, he said, “we’re supposed to honor those who gave all, and [protesters are] there disrespecting and attacking those men and women of ICE who strap a gun to their hip every day [and] go out and protect people they don’t even know or never will meet.”
We are supposed to remember those who gave all, but what Tom Homan gets wrong is that the reason they gave all was so the rest of us can enjoy the FREEDOM provided by democracy. They didn’t die so that we could have an unaccountable police state, illegal detention, and chemical weapons used against American civilians.
Having read the letter from the strikers and the comments of DHS and Tom Homan and bouncing them off of Austin Kocher’s analysis of the data, it’s abundantly clear who is lying.
Delaney Hall is not an outlier. The abuses occurring there have been documented elsewhere and are, in fact, indicative of all ICE detention centers. The claims they make about the immigration courts are indicative of courts across the country.
ICE must be abolished.
I thank you for reading.
Sources:
Protests-ice-immigration-detention-center-new-jersey, Jose Olivares and Julius Constantine Motal, The Guardian, 30 May 2026
Ice-detention-camp-delaney-hall, Moira Donegan, The Guardian, 2 Jun 2026
https://www.lahuelga.com/sos The 2nd Letter from Delaney Hall Strikers
The-GEO-Group-Awarded-15-Year-Contract-1000-Bed-Delaney-Hall, Businesswire, 27 Feb, 2025
Tear-gas-and-pepper-spray-are-chemical-weapons-so-why-can-police-use-them, Alex Milan Tracy, The Conversation, 11 Jun 2020
Dhs-debunks-sanctuary-politicians-smears-about-ices-delaney-hall, ICE, 29 May 2026
Tom-homan-trump-admin-immigration-enforcement-detainees-hunger-strike, Ryan Mancini, The Hill, 27 May 2026
Dhs-debunks-new-jersey-sanctuary-politicians-smears-against-ice-facility, DHS, 25 May 2026
Delaney-hall-inmates-are-treated-better-than-90-of-the-world-says-nj-congressman, Nicholas Fernandes and Patrick Lanni, NJ.com, 2 Jun 2026
https://www.justice.gov/eoir/page/file/1480811/dl, Do You Just Want to Go Home? Gov’t guidance on “voluntary departure.”