Rep. Joaquin Castro, together with greater than 110 Democratic members of Congress, has despatched a letter to Secretary of Homeland Safety Markwayne Mullin urging the shutdown of the Dilley Immigration Processing Heart in Texas.
The ability, which is the one household detention middle within the nation, was closed throughout the Biden administration however was reopened final 12 months as a part of the Trump administration’s ongoing immigration crackdown.
Within the letter, which was first obtained by ABC Information, they write, “There is no such thing as a humane strategy to imprison a toddler and their household. It’s nothing greater than a trailer jail that detains households. In actual fact, the Dilley facility is the one place in america devoted to detaining households with kids who haven’t been charged with a criminal offense.”
“Former and present detained households describe horrific situations perpetuated by CoreCivic and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) that should strip them of their dignity and make them really feel hopeless,” the letter says, referring to the non-public jail contractor that operates the Dilley facility.
The letter outlines how dad and mom have described “horrendous situations at Dilley,” together with allegations of meals “contaminated with worms and mildew,” ingesting water that leaves detainees feeling sick, lights that keep on by the night time and insufficient schooling and medical care that has led to “extreme despair, hopelessness and suicidal ideation amongst their kids,” based on the letter.
Medical care “is delayed, denied, and in lots of circumstances outright dismissed, even when kids are struggling life threatening medical emergencies,” the letter says, describing an alleged incident through which a younger boy was not taken to the hospital till after a number of days of “extreme abdomen ache,” after which he was identified with appendicitis and required surgical procedure.
Immigrant advocates, medical professionals and lawmakers have beforehand raised issues about situations on the South Texas facility.
Origami cranes are pinned on fencing outdoors the South Texas Household Residential Heart in Dilley, Texas, June 27, 2026.
Joel Angel Juarez/Reuters
ABC Information in February interviewed a couple who mentioned their 1-year-old daughter contracted COVID-19 and RSV throughout their 60-day detention. The household alleged that medical workers at Dilley dismissed their daughter’s signs.
Rep. Castro raised his personal issues a couple of 2-month previous he encountered whereas visiting one other household on the facility in February.
On the time, the highest medical official on the Division of Homeland Safety, which operates the nation’s migrant detention facilities, disputed any suggestion that detainees are being denied correct care.
“These allegations of unlawful aliens being denied correct medical care in ICE custody are FALSE,” DHS Chief Medical Officer Dr. Sean Conley informed ABC Information in an announcement. “It’s each coverage and longstanding follow for aliens to obtain well timed and applicable medical care from the second they enter ICE custody. This contains medical, dental, ladies’s well being, psychological well being providers, any wanted comply with up medical appointments, in addition to 24-hour emergency care.”
“That is higher, extra responsive well being care than many aliens have ever obtained of their whole lives,” Conley’s assertion mentioned.
“These representatives stay quiet in regards to the humanitarian disaster that was manufactured by the Biden Administration’s open border insurance policies during the last 4 years and the scores of youngsters exploited, trafficked and lacking,” a DHS spokesperson mentioned. “Do they plan to say the psychiatric affect on the tens of hundreds of youngsters who have been smuggled throughout the border — many by human and intercourse traffickers?”
“We have jumpstarted our efforts to rescue kids who have been victims of intercourse and labor trafficking by working with our state and native regulation enforcement companions to find these kids. President Trump and DHS are laser-focused on defending kids and can proceed to work with federal, state, and native regulation enforcement to reunite kids with their households,” the spokesperson mentioned.
“These allegations will not be in keeping with documented situations at Dilley,” CoreCivic spokesperson Steven Owen mentioned in an announcement. “Impartial state and native testing confirms the water — the identical municipal water the encompassing neighborhood drinks — is secure. Households obtain three meals day by day from menus reviewed and authorised by a registered dietitian, and care from pediatricians, little one psychiatrists and different clinicians who serve them day by day with ability and compassion.”
“Selections about who’s detained and for a way lengthy relaxation with the federal authorities, not CoreCivic,” Owen mentioned.
The Democrats’ letter claims that kids are held on the Dilley facility past the final 20-day restrict established beneath the Flores Settlement Settlement, a authorized settlement from the Nineteen Nineties that outlines applicable protections and situations for detaining minors.
“Households at Dilley report being held properly past that restrict with no clear timeline or rationalization,” the letter says. “In February and March 2026, the federal government has acknowledged that kids’s common time in custody at Dilley was roughly 57 days, and the median time in custody was roughly 44 days, with 92 kids being detained for 61-90 days, and 80 kids detained for greater than 91 days.”
A DHS spokesperson, responding to a February ABC News report in regards to the prolonged custody occasions, mentioned, “For years, the Flores consent decree has been a device of the left to advertise an open borders agenda. It’s lengthy overdue for a single district in California to cease managing the Govt Department’s immigration features. The Trump administration is dedicated to restoring widespread sense to our immigration system.”
“No little one must be in a spot just like the Dilley Trailer Jail,” Castro mentioned in an announcement. “Underneath Trump, ICE is ripping kids away from their households, college, and lives. They need to be handled like children — not criminals. I’m grateful that over 100 of my colleagues in Congress are becoming a member of the battle to close down the Dilley Trailer Jail.”
Along with shuttering Dilley, the letter calls for that DHS terminates the contract it has with CoreCivic, alleging that “CoreCivic is prioritizing income over humane therapy of its detainees.”
“No little one and household must be imprisoned for looking for security by legitimately following United States immigration legal guidelines,” the letter says. “The USA has the instruments, the assets, and the authorized framework to course of these households with out detention.”
