TranslatePolitics.com

Norma J. Torres

Democrat

“I want to shine a light on a problem. People are dying in federal detention facilities. It is a growing problem. There are many arrests. The conditions are bad. People are not getting their medications. A man named Edwin died. A judge said to fix the conditions but it did not happen. That is cruelty by design. We need oversight. We cannot remain silent.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to shine the light on a growing problem in Federal detention facilities, federally owned and privately supervised. Every single day, we stand in this Chamber, look at that flag, and pledge ``with liberty and justice for all.'' Right now, those words are a hollow lie. Today, we learned that Edwin Jovanny Lopez-Cornejo, a 41-year-old Salvadoran man, died after a medical emergency at Delaney Hall in New Jersey. His family says he had complained about not receiving his medications. The day before he died, he told his mother he had lost feeling in his face and arm. Now, his family is left demanding answers. Edwin is not alone. Under this administration, immigration enforcement isn't just broken. It is lethal. We are witnessing a systematic deadly abuse of power by DHS, ICE, and Border Patrol. It is happening with complete arrogant impunity. The American public sees exactly what is happening, and they have rejected it so strongly that some have even lost their lives standing up against it: Renee Good and Alex Pretti, to name just two. This chaos is not accidental. It is a direct result of a policy that prioritizes arbitrary numbers over public safety. Under an aggressive quota demanding 2,000 arrests a day, raids have surged by 600 percent. In a single month, Federal agents swept up 800 people every single day who have had zero criminal records, relying on broad profiling, street roundups, and community checkpoints. To hold this wave of arrests, detention populations have surged by 140 percent, cramming over 60,000 human beings into overcrowded facilities, where basic standards of health, safety, and human dignity have broken down. In my home State of California, at the Adelanto facility, Carlitos Ricardo Parias, a man from Los Angeles held for months, filmed the filthy water detainees were forced to drink. It was crawling with live wormlike parasites in their potable water, just weeks after a Federal judge ordered the facility to fix those conditions. That isn't negligence. That is cruelty by design. When you treat human beings in an intentionally dangerous manner and deprive them of food that is not rotten and potable water, they die. Mr. Speaker, 76 lives have ended in ICE custody or immediately after release since January 2025. That is the highest death toll of any administration in its first 2 years in more than two decades. The mortality rate in ICE detention has exploded fourfold. What is the administration's response? To limit their own oversight visits, cutting them in half, from twice a year to once a year, and in some cases to once every 2 years. They have purchased privately contracted facilities to prevent State and local oversight. They think that changing the paperwork will wipe the blood off their hands. We all know that it will not. I am the mother of a law enforcement officer. I know what it means to wear a badge. I know the sacrifice required to protect a community. Let me be crystal clear: Protect the badge. Do not protect the bad behavior. When you excuse abuse, when you shield rogue agents, when you fail to hold Federal officers to the same basic standards as a basic peace officer in any city across the country, you destroy public trust and disgrace every honest officer trying to do his or her best to protect their community. I know the terror of this abuse personally. When we tried to conduct oversight, ICE responded by shooting CS gas and then lied about it. A vehicle matching an ICE van once tried to run me off the freeway, right in my district. So when I ask what an innocent family is supposed to do when an unmarked vehicle chases them down a highway; I am not asking simply to ask a question. I am exposing a dangerous, lawless reality. We cannot look away. Congress cannot remain silent while the executive branch operates a deadly machine of abuse, intimidation, military grade weapons, and imprisonment. When Members of Congress or Senators try to reduce deaths in custody and conduct oversight, they should never be met with lethal force. Liberty and justice for all does not end at the gates of a detention center. It does not disappear on a dark highway. These 76 people mean something. They are our neighbors. They are our friends. They are our relatives. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Espaillat), chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Adriano Espaillat

Democrat 6:40 p.m.

“I don't like Trump. ICE is bad. 76 people died. That's a lot. People are mad. I went to court. I want to check on the detention centers. They need to be better. People don't like ICE. It's bad. A man named Lorenzo died. That was sad. It could have been stopped. We need more rules. No masks. Body cameras. Less guns. More rules. Republicans gave them money. That was bad. I want more rules.”

Official Congressional Record

Thank you, Congresswoman Torres, for your leadership on this issue and convening us here tonight. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to forcefully speak against the Trump administration's horrific ICE abuses and to demand accountability for the deaths of 76 individuals that have died at the hands of DHS since the start of 2025. Whether in ICE detention or due to violence in our street, DHS is responsible for the deaths of 35 individuals--and one more today--this year. The American public is outraged at the brutality of ICE, and they demand accountability. We demand accountability. For that reason, Members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus went to court in order to access those detention centers so that we could exercise our oversight duties and make sure that the conditions are right and humane. According to polls, 63 percent of Americans, both Democrats and Republicans, disapprove of the way ICE is enforcing immigration laws. We all know ``ICE is out of control''; ``ICE estan fuera de control.'' In July, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, Congresswoman Sylvia Garcia, and Homeland Security Democrats held an oversight forum in Houston after the killing of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo. Like Lorenzo's family, dozens of families across the country continue to mourn the unjust death of their loved ones. We know these deaths could have been prevented. That is why the Hispanic Caucus has continued to push for guardrails in all ICE funding, requiring for ICE agents to identify themselves, no masks during enforcement, body cameras recording all enforcement actions, limits on firearms used in civil immigration operations, and protections of sensitive locations, and many more. In less than a year, Republicans have given nearly a quarter of a trillion dollars to immigration enforcement without any guardrails. Not one. The CHC will continue to demand reforms and accountability.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Sylvia R. Garcia

Democrat 6:40 p.m.

“I'm here to talk about a man who died. An ICE agent shot him. The man was unarmed and not a criminal. He was just going to work. The ICE agent did not give any warning. The man's family found out on Facebook. That's sad and bad. ICE is not good. We need someone to check on them. We want the truth.”

Official Congressional Record

Thank you to the gentlewoman from California for the time. Mr. Speaker, I am here to speak about a killing in my district. On July 7, an ICE agent shot and killed Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, an unarmed man with no criminal record, who was not even the target of their investigation. He was headed to a construction job when ICE aggressively pursued his van in an unmarked vehicle. No sirens, no body cameras, no dash cameras, just two unmarked cars following him. Then, an ICE agent fired through the open passenger's side window where Mr. Lorenzo's brother was sitting and killed him. Afterward came the same disgraceful playbook we saw after the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis. They claim Lorenzo, who was the driver, had weaponized his vehicle and that an agent had acted in self-defense. I spoke directly with two of the men inside that van. They told me ICE never identified themselves, never gave commands, and no agent was ever in front of the van. Then, in an added layer of cruelty, DHS, the Department of Homeland Security, released Mr. Salgado's name publicly before notifying his family. I was at the hospital when his son had to learn, through Facebook, that his father was dead. It was sickening. It was disheartening. It was despicable. Days later, DHS tried to smear Lorenzo even further by suggesting that drugs had been found in the van. It was not drugs. It was a homemade electrolyte mix workers use to survive the Texas heat. This is an outrageous abuse of government power. ICE pursued the wrong van and killed an unarmed man who wasn't their target and had no criminal record, and now we are expected to trust DHS to investigate itself. That is laughable. Absolutely not. No way. We need a real, independent investigation. We need all evidence released, and we need real accountability. We also need the truth about what happened to Mr. Salgado. His family deserves the truth. The public deserves accountability. We need justice for Mr. Salgado, and we need justice for all those killed at the hands of ICE or those in the custody of ICE. We demand accountability, and as the gentlewoman has said, we need real justice for all.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Joaquin Castro

Democrat 6:50 p.m.

“I don't like ICE. They are bad. They killed some people. They work with Trump and his friends. They stop people for no reason. They put kids and pregnant women in jail. Companies make money from that. That is bad. We need to get rid of ICE.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, I rise today because we have all witnessed the brutality of ICE on the streets of America, and Members of Congress have witnessed that brutality behind the closed walls of detention centers across our Nation. ICE has become a rogue, abusive agency that should be disbanded. ICE agents are roving across our communities with impunity, killing people in cold blood, including U.S. citizens, while Donald Trump's cronies profit. These ICE agents have not gone rogue alone. The entire agency has gone rogue under the direction of Donald Trump and Stephen Miller. Masked ICE agents in unmarked cars are working with Trump allies, like Texas Governor Greg Abbott, to meet quotas that fuel the President's mass deportation campaign. Every single day they are stopping, profiling hardworking Brown men on their way to construction jobs in the early morning, families on their way to school, going to pick up their kids, and H-E-B workers, grocery store workers in Texas getting off their shifts at warehouses and stores at night. Let us remember the names of those whom ICE has murdered. The first one was a San Antonian, Ruben Ray Martinez. There was another Texan, Lorenzo Salgado Araujo of Houston. Renee Good, Alex Pretti, and Johan Sebastian Duran Guerrero--these folks were victims of the ICE murders. In Texas alone, over a dozen people have died in ICE detention. These deaths are not accidents of an overwhelmed system. They are the results of this administration engineering a rogue agency to profit at the expense of vulnerable people. We must shut down places like the Dilley detention center, a trailer prison, where children as young as 2 months old are in prison. For each child who is thrown in there, for each pregnant woman thrown into Dilley, there is an American company, CoreCivic, with American investors who make more money for each child, each woman, and each person who is in prison. We have allowed for the commodification of child imprisonment in our United States of America under President Donald Trump. This must change. ICE should be disbanded. It has gone rogue, and we must shut down the Dilley detention center.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Norma J. Torres

Democrat 6:50 p.m.

“I don't like ICE. They are bad. They put kids in jail for a long time. That is sad.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Imagine being a 16-year-old boy and knowing that you will only get 10 minutes to talk to your father every 2 weeks. That is the reality for one teenager detained at the ICE facility in Dilley, Texas. He has been detained for more than 4 months and has lost 10 pounds. He has described living in rooms with cockroaches, spiders, and mosquitoes. This is a 16-year-old child. What gets me most is what those 10 minutes with his father must be like. Instead of calling his dad to talk about school, his friends, or what he wants to do with his life, he is watching the clock, knowing that when those 10 minutes are over, he will have to wait another 2 weeks just to hear his father's voice. He is not alone. At least 60 children at this facility have been held for more than 100 days despite a court order limiting their detention to 20 days. These are children in prison. Think about what those months mean to a child. They are months away from their parents, months away from their classrooms, and months of their childhood stolen by this administration. That is why these detention facilities matter when we talk about death in ICE and CBP custody. The harm does not begin when someone dies. It begins when we decide that being in government custody means that you can be separated from your family, denied basic dignity, and treated as though your life does not matter. These are children. Our government has a responsibility to protect them, and it should never be the reason that they lose their childhood. I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Menendez).

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Robert Menendez

Democrat 6:50 p.m.

“I don't like Trump or ICE. I think they are very bad. I keep talking about how bad they are. Republicans are also bad and mean. I want people to be very angry and upset. I want to blame Republicans for everything bad.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, last year, I stood outside Delaney Hall in Newark, New Jersey, and made the dire observation that no one is safe in Trump's America. Since then, three people that we know of have died after medical emergencies at Delaney Hall, including Edwin Lopez- Cornejo, who leaves behind his 12-year-old U.S. citizen daughter. In private detention centers across the country, ICE and their private partners, like The GEO Group, are continuing down this dangerous path without any regard to the human cost of their actions. In my over 20 visits to Delaney Hall, I have seen a man with a debilitating condition refused a wheelchair for weeks, and when finally given one, was forced to stay in medical isolation for months; a woman who suffered a miscarriage and was told she had a psychological pregnancy; requests for medication and post-op care that go unanswered. These are not mistakes or oversights. This is a deliberate choice by this administration to inflict pain and suffering because their cruelty knows no bounds. This is happening across the country. Thirty-one people died in ICE detention last year, the most in more than 20 years. This year, 24 more people have lost their lives. However, ICE isn't just killing people in detention. They are shooting American citizens like Renee Good and Alex Pretti in broad daylight. This should outrage every American. Yet here, in this Chamber, what has been the response of our Republican colleagues? It has been silence. While they carry their Bibles to church on Sunday, they carry the word of Donald Trump and Stephen Miller every other day of the week, and they are responsible for what is happening across our country. Instead of finding their voice to speak out against this administration, they are trying to suppress and silence the voices of Americans, whether by limiting their ability to vote by mail or limiting the number of polling locations in Texas, because Republicans know they have failed. They have failed their constituents. They have failed their country, and they know Americans are angry, as I am angry. We will end this national nightmare with or without them. We will protect our communities. We will hold accountable everyone who is responsible for the lawlessness, pain, and terror that this administration has inflicted on all of our communities, and we will remember everyone here who stayed silent in this moment.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Yvette D. Clarke

Democrat 7:00 p.m.

“I don't like Trump or ICE. I think they are very bad. I keep talking about how bad they are. Republicans are also bad and mean. I want people to be very angry and upset. I want to blame Republicans for everything bad.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, I rise on this day in righteous indignation and vehement opposition to the barbaric policing, detention, and, indeed, even murder of immigrants at the hands of the Department of Homeland Security, ICE, and CBP, on the orders of Donald Trump. With immunity granted not by the law, but by lawlessness, President Trump's untrained, unrestrained, and utterly amoral agents within ICE and CBP are perpetrating a crusade of cruelty with very few parallels in our history. It has struck our neighbors, taken our loved ones from their homes, and left dozens of decent people on our streets and those illegally detained dead with no crimes committed, but a belief in an American Dream that no longer exists and has become a living nightmare. To my GOP colleagues, tell me this: In what moral, God-fearing nation would the penalty for seeking a better life be a brutal death? In what modern country would people fleeing injustice and inhumanity find nothing but more injustice and more inhumanity? The Statue of Liberty begs to give us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. Those words call out to the world's most vulnerable people so America might be their survival and not their death. It is time for this terrible experiment in Trumpism to end and, in turn, to secure a new immigration system centered on compassion, not cruelty, not dehumanization, and not death; entrusted to competent officers, not kidnapping, not killer thugs; and bent toward justice, not broken by Donald Trump.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Norma J. Torres

Democrat 7:00 p.m.

“I want to talk about people who called 911 from inside a government building. I used to answer 911 calls. Some people called 911 from inside a government building because they were sick or in pain. The government did not help them. Three people died in six weeks. This is bad. The people who died are not just numbers. They had families. The government should be responsible. We need answers. The families should know why their loved one died.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, I want you to think about what it means to dial 911. You call 911 when you are scared, when you are in danger, or when you need help and you need that help immediately. I know this because for 17\1/2\ years I was that voice on the other side, answering 911 calls, people's calls for help. Imagine, Mr. Speaker, having to make that call from inside a Federal detention center. That is what happened at Camp East Montana in El Paso, Texas, where ProPublica reviewed more than 160 emergency calls from inside the facility. People were calling 911 because they were sick, in pain, or desperately needed medical help from a place where the United States Government was responsible for keeping them safe but was denying them the help that they needed. Three men died in just 6 weeks. That is why we are here today. People like Geraldo Lunas Campos told the staff at this location that he needed help, and his cries were ignored. He is not just another statistic, and neither are the other people who have died in ICE and CBP custody. They are fathers, sons, brothers, friends, and people with families waiting for them to come home. When the government takes away someone else's freedom, it takes on the responsibility for that person's life. Mr. Speaker, you cannot lock someone behind a government door, ignore their cries for help, feed them rotten food and bad water, and then act surprised when someone dies. These deaths deserve answers. They deserve accountability. The families who lost someone in government custody deserve to know why their loved one died and why they did not come home. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone), who is soon to be Chairman Pallone.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Frank Pallone, Jr.

Democrat 7:00 p.m.

“I want to add to what Norma Torres said. I went to a government building where they keep immigrants. The building is too small. It can't hold enough people. The people in the building don't get the help they need. Some people even died because they didn't get help. This is wrong. We need answers. The government should tell us what happened. We need to make sure this doesn't happen again.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, I want to take this opportunity to thank Congresswoman Norma Torres for leading this important Special Order here tonight. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to condemn a dangerous and unaccountable immigration enforcement system that is harming the very communities our government is supposed to protect. I want to focus particularly on the problems that we have and the failure of these facilities to provide basic medical services. I have seen the consequences firsthand during my visit to Delaney Hall, or my several visits, I should say, to Delaney Hall in Newark, New Jersey. The facility has inadequate medical facilities. The medical clinic is too small and lacks adequate staff. The times I visited, there were maybe 600 or 700 people. The capacity is 1,200. There was no way that clinic could take care of and do the proper thing for the people who were detained. Detainees there told me that often they waited 1 week or more to access the medical clinic. They were unable to get necessary care and medications. Some required surgery that was long delayed. In my opinion, detention should never be a death sentence, but that is what we are seeing at Delaney Hall and the other detention facilities around the country. Three people connected to Delaney Hall have now died in less than 1 year: Jean Wilson Brutus, Edwin Lopez-Cornejo, and Jose Chajon-Raxon. We have to remember their names. Their deaths demand answers about the conditions at Delaney Hall and whether ICE and its contractors protected people in their custody. Delaney Hall is a privately run detention facility. The operator profits from the denial of medical care. I led 87 House Democrats in demanding answers from DHS and ICE about these deaths and failures of medical care throughout the detention system in the United States. Mr. Speaker, these detention facilities are required by Federal law to provide certain medical services, and I assure you they are not doing so. DHS, ICE, and CBP must be subject to meaningful oversight and held accountable when people suffer or die under their care. The Trump administration in June canceled a rule that required reporting of deaths even after a detainee was released from a detention facility and an investigation within 30 days. There are probably a lot more deaths than those we have been talking about tonight that are not reported by ICE since this rule was eliminated. Enforcing our immigration laws is no excuse for violating constitutional rights, putting human lives at risk, or essentially killing people. Those who have died in government custody deserve more than silence. Their lives matter, and their families deserve answers and accountability.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Linda T. Sanchez

Democrat 7:10 p.m.

“I don't like what the last government did. Some people died. It made me sad. That government was very bad. The place where they kept immigrants was very bad. People didn't have water or doctors. A judge made the government give them those things. I want this to stop. I don't want the government to send people away. I want the government to be nice to everyone.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, the Trump administration has been terrorizing our communities with ICE for nearly 2 years, and people are dying because of it. We all watched in horror when two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis were shot and killed in the street in broad daylight, then more shootings happened in Maine and Texas. People were shot and killed who weren't even the target of the enforcement action. Everyone who claims to support civil liberties should be alarmed by these shootings. These deaths are only part of this administration's cruelty. Since Trump took office, more than 50 people have died while in DHS custody, and that number is probably even higher. That rate is double the rate of previous years. The death toll keeps rising because this administration refuses to recognize the humanity of those in its custody. I have traveled to the Adelanto ICE facility in California, which has been linked to at least two of those deaths. Detained immigrants there lacked basic necessities, like clean drinking water and medical care. It was so bad that a Federal judge had to order the Department of Homeland Security to provide the basic human necessities. That is how depraved this has become. This is what happens when an administration demonizes immigrants and treats them as though they are less than human. Congress must say enough is enough, stop the mass deportation, and stop the mass detention. Everyone deserves dignity, and everyone, regardless of their immigration status, deserves basic care and the due process that is required by our Constitution. Mr. Speaker, we must all raise our voices to tell this administration enough is enough.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Judy Chu

Democrat 7:10 p.m.

“I don't like the last government. They kept immigrants in a bad place. Those people died. It made me sad. The place was very very bad. A judge said it was bad. I want this to stop. I think the other party did this. I think they spent a lot of money on it. I don't like that they spent money on it. I want people to be free. I want the government to stop sending people away.”

Official Congressional Record

Under Donald Trump's watch, 56 people have died in ICE custody since January, roughly one person every 11 days. Countless more individuals have suffered inside U.S. detention, denied medical care, served rotten food and dirty water, and held in filthy conditions that breed illness. For the past 10 years, I have witnessed conditions firsthand at Adelanto ICE Processing Center, one of the deadliest immigration detention facilities in the country. During Trump's second term alone, five people have died, four while in custody and one shortly after being released: Gabriel Garcia-Aviles, Ismael Ayala-Uribe, Alberto Gutierrez-Reyes, Irvin Cruz Nape, and Jose Ramos-Solano. These were fathers, grandfathers, and community members whose lives were needlessly and painfully cut short. In June, I met directly with Adelanto detainees on a hunger strike. They told me how they use their own underwear to filter worms out of their drinking water, how the food they have been given is rotten or raw, and how they have watched fellow detainees suffer and ultimately die from medical emergencies when all ICE offered them was ibuprofen. These conditions are so severe that, in July, a Federal judge ruled that ICE must immediately overhaul the living conditions in Adelanto. This is not an accident. It is a result of a system that Republicans in Congress continue to fund without demanding a single reform. They have handed ICE billions of dollars with no accountability for the deaths, abuse, or suffering happening on their watch. Americans don't want this. They want ICE out of their communities. They want Congress to hold this agency accountable for the lives lost and the lives still at risk inside facilities like Adelanto.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Pramila Jayapal

Democrat 7:10 p.m.

“I don't like the last government. They kept immigrants in a bad place. Those people died. It made me sad. The place was very very bad. A judge said it was bad. I want this to stop. I think the other party did this. I think they spent a lot of money on it. I don't like that they spent money on it. I want people to be free. I want the government to stop sending people away.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, I thank Congresswoman Torres and the CHC, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, for their leadership on this issue. As ICE detains record numbers of people in overcrowded, unsanitary immigration prisons, 56 people have died under Donald Trump's administration, a 22-year high. Let's be very clear: It is all about the money. Two for-profit corporations, GEO Group and CoreCivic, operate the majority of detention beds. Together, they raked in $1.4 billion in quarterly revenue last spring. Every single night, U.S. taxpayers are paying $150 to $350 per person, per night to detain over 65,000 people. The Trump administration has rolled back detention standards and gutted oversight, allowing corporations to cut corners and maximize profits. GEO and CoreCivic donated nearly $2.8 million to Donald Trump's 2024 election. They are paying the administration to boost their profits at taxpayer expense. Meanwhile, who is Trump detaining? By ICE's own statistics, 70 percent have no criminal record. Increasingly, these are people that ICE would never have detained before: pregnant women, people with serious medical conditions, parents, people with green cards, and people showing up to their immigration appointments. As ranking member of the Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement Subcommittee, I am notified of every single death that happens in detention. Behind every single one is a name. Edwin Lopez-Cornejo died at GEO Group's Delaney Hall. He was a 41- year-old father of a 12-year-old U.S. citizen. ICE refused to give him his diabetes medication. His brother said he couldn't get Tylenol, let alone proper care. Nenko Gantchev died under similar circumstances at another GEO facility. His health seriously deteriorated in detention as ICE reportedly provided no accommodation for his diabetes. The coroner declared one death a homicide--Geraldo Lunas Campos, a 55-year-old father of four. Two weeks ago, I led a congressional delegation to inspect CoreCivic's Stewart Detention Center. We met a young man who fled the war in Yemen and has been detained for 24 months. He has no criminal record. Just that morning, ICE pulled his tooth. Blood was still pooling in his mouth as he met with us. We met a 72-year-old man whose U.S.-citizen wife is in end-stage renal failure. ICE picked him up at his green card appointment. He has no criminal record and just wants to care for his wife. We met a woman who can no longer conceive because she was subjected to a medical procedure without her consent in ICE custody. She is having healthcare issues, but she is terrified to seek care again from ICE. Meanwhile, her teenage daughter is suffering alone. We are creating generational trauma. In my district, ICE arrests are at an all-time high. GEO refuses to obey Washington State law or even allow health inspectors in. This has never been about the so-called worst of the worst. It has always been about the right wing's racist, fascist vision of ridding America of immigrants. Mr. Speaker, Americans are rejecting this. When I am chair of the Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement Subcommittee come January, I intend to hold these people accountable for the cruelty and corruption and pass comprehensive, humane immigration reform.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Becca Balint

Democrat 7:10 p.m.

“I don't like the last government. They kept people in a bad place. Those people died. It made me sad. I think the other party did this. They had power. They used it wrong. I want this to stop. I think the other party failed. They spent money on it. I want to spend money to stop this. I want people to be okay. I want the government to be good to people. We should treat people well. We should give them help. We should tell the truth. We should be nice to them. I don't want people to be in a bad place. I want them to be free.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, I thank Representatives Torres and Jayapal for their leadership. I am very happy to speak here tonight on an issue that is so important to so many Americans. I want to talk about power tonight, Mr. Speaker. Before I came to Congress, I was a public school teacher. I can tell you, when you are a teacher, you have a lot of power over the young people in your classroom. You set the rules. You decide when to speak and when to listen. You can make students feel seen or feel small. I learned very quickly that the more power that you have over someone, the greater responsibility you have to them. This is the lesson that this administration hasn't learned. Right now, we are watching our government exercise enormous power over people who have almost none, and they are doing it carelessly, with deadly consequences. Since President Trump took office, 56 people have died in ICE custody. This is a failure beyond measure. Every one of those people was a human being: someone's mother, someone's father, someone's child, someone who others had been waiting to come home, our friends, our neighbors, our family. When a government, our government, takes someone into custody, it is making a commitment. It is a commitment that while you are in our care, we are responsible for you. If you are sick, we have a responsibility to give you access to healthcare. If something goes terribly wrong, we have a responsibility to tell your family the truth about what happened quickly and transparently. There is no immigration status that changes that or makes a human being disposable or expendable. In a democracy, dignity and due process are not optional. There is a lot of talk in this Chamber all the time about who belongs in this country, but tonight I will ask you this: What do we owe the people whose lives we have put in our hands? We owe them due process. We owe them care. We owe them dignity. We owe their families the truth. When we fail them, we owe them accountability. In this room, we have a responsibility, too. We must stop funding a lawless and chaotic immigration enforcement system that has treated human lives as expendable. We have to use our power. Every government official who has abused their power and contributed to this horrific death toll must be held accountable.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Timothy M. Kennedy

Democrat 7:20 p.m.

“I am sad that some people died. I think the other party did this. They had power. They used it wrong. I want this to stop. I think the other party failed. They spent money on it. I want to spend money to stop this. I want people to be okay. I want the government to be good to people. We should treat people well. We should give them help. We should tell the truth. We should be nice to them. I don't want people to be in a bad place. I want them to be free. I want to make a new law. My law will stop this. It will make the government tell us about people. No one will wonder if their family is safe. The government did this wrong. They must change. They must be good to people. They must follow the law. The other party is bad. They hurt people. They make people scared. They are mean. Our country should be better. We should be good to everyone. That is our promise. I want us to keep it. I want the other party to change. I want them to be good to people. I want them to follow the law. I want them to stop hurting people.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, I thank the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and Congresswoman Norma Torres for convening today's critically important Special Order hour. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to remember those whose lives have been cut short at the hands of Trump's out-of-control Department of Homeland Security and to demand accountability for the families who have been left shattered. In January of this year, the killing of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti by DHS personnel forever changed how Americans view this department. A month later, the DHS culture of cruelty rocked our community in Buffalo, New York, the City of Good Neighbors. Nurul Amin Shah Alam was a 56-year-old Rohingya refugee who came to our country legally after fleeing persecution and violence, seeking safety for himself and his family. He was nearly blind and spoke very little English. He couldn't read, write, or navigate on his own. On February 19, DHS personnel abandoned him, alone, miles from his home outside of a closed coffee shop in the cold, dead of winter. Neither his family nor his attorney were notified of his release. There was no coordinated hand off and no plan to protect a vulnerable man. Five days later, he was found dead. His death was ruled a homicide. Mr. Shah Alam should be alive today, which is why I introduced the DHS Release Transparency Act to prevent tragedies like this. No family should ever have to wonder if their loved one is safe after being released from government custody. DHS was created in the aftermath of 9/11 for one fundamental purpose: to keep the American people safe. Under President Trump, DHS has become synonymous with fear, deadly force, cruelty, and utter disregard for human decency. Our government has a moral obligation to protect human rights, to live up to our unique role as a beacon of democracy. The Constitution does not permit government officials to act with impunity, to use violence without accountability, or to treat human life as disposable. Trump has turned government into a weapon, incited violence in our communities, and made fear and dehumanization the defining features of his immigration policy. When those in power normalize brutality, they denigrate the sacrifices that have been made for our freedom. When they abuse people in their custody, they shatter the bonds of the social contract that ties us together. When they refuse to answer for the harm they cause, they erode the core promise at the heart of the American experiment, that every person is entitled to dignity, due process, and equal justice under the law. Under Democratic leadership, this body will hold DHS accountable and uphold the oath that we all take to the Nation and to the Constitution.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Sam T. Liccardo

Democrat 7:20 p.m.

“I am sad that some people died. I think the other party did this. They had power. They used it wrong. I want this to stop. I want people to be okay. I don't want people to be in a bad place. The government did this wrong. They must change. They must be good to people. They must follow the law. The other party is bad. They hurt people. They make people scared. They are mean. Our country should be better. We should be good to everyone. That is our promise. I want us to keep it. I want the other party to change. I want them to be good to people. I want them to follow the law. I want them to stop hurting people. I want the government to help people. I want the government to be nice to people. I want the government to follow the law. I don't want the government to put people in jail. Jail is bad. Jail hurts people. Jail makes people sad. I want the government to help people be free. Free is good. Free makes people happy. Free makes people strong. Free makes people proud. I want people to be proud of our country. I want people to love our country. I want people to trust our country. I want our country to be good.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, I thank Representative Torres for her leadership. Mr. Speaker, a graveyard of living people, is how Lorenzo described Camp East Montana, the ICE detention facility where guards denied him sunlight and fresh air for a full month. Lorenzo persevered. Mr. Speaker, 52 others would never feel the sun upon their face again. Fifty-two people have died in ICE custody since Donald Trump took office. They were mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, daughters and sons, every one someone's child. Every one a child of God. Someone loves us. Someone mourns us. When we die, grief takes part of them with us. My heart aches for the families who never got the chance to say good- bye, who never held their loved one's hand before they died alone behind barbed wire and concrete. I have undocumented neighbors in San Jose who have lived there for more than two decades. They have built lives there. They have built families there. Some coach for youth sports teams and others volunteer at their church. Several have built businesses, employing U.S. citizens. All have built our community. This is not the first time our country has put the most ambitious of our Dreamers and doers behind bars. In 1942, my father came home telling my grandfather that his friend was missing from their weekly pick-up baseball game. It turned out his friend, Norm, had been taken with his family from their home on 5th Street in San Jose and incarcerated in Heart Mountain, Wyoming. Norm was Japanese American. That young boy returned to San Jose and grew up. Decades later, I had the honor of working for him as his intern. His name is Norm Mineta, and he served in this Congress for two decades. The incarceration of 120,000 Japanese Americans left an indelible stain on our country. The last of those who endured it still walk among us, and the ghosts of those who did not endure it still haunt our national conscience. History will harshly judge us also for the abusive and inhuman treatment of our undocumented neighbors. Too many of us have declined to speak out, or perhaps only when ICE's chaotic cruelty takes the life of an American citizen as in Minneapolis. Yet the deaths in our DHS detention centers continue unabated, accompanied only by the incriminating silence of the quietly complicit. I am proud that in my own Bay Area region: San Mateo County, the city of San Jose, Santa Clara County, and Napa County have all taken steps to obstruct the construction of new detention centers in our communities. We are helping them and others with a toolkit that includes a model ordinance, but local leaders should never have to fight this battle alone. Congress must act. We must defend human dignity. We must uphold our Constitution, and we must stop digging graveyards for the living.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Adelita S. Grijalva

Democrat 7:30 p.m.

“I am sad that a man died. He was in government custody. The government did not help him. They did not give him care. He died from a bad tooth. That should not happen. The government should help people. They should give them care. I want to know why this happened. I want to know what went wrong. I want the government to tell us. I want them to be open. I want them to change. I want them to help people. I don't want people to die. I want people to be safe. I want people to have care. I want the government to do better. I want them to be good to people. I want them to follow the law. I want them to be kind. I want them to be fair. I want them to be just. I want them to be good. I want them to be right. I want them to be true. I want them to be strong. I want them to be wise. I want them to be brave. I want them to be free. I want them to be safe. I want them to be home.”

Official Congressional Record

I thank Representative Torres and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus for hosting this Special Order hour. In Arizona, we have seen firsthand why congressional oversight of our immigration detention systems matter. We have also been witness to inhumane conditions and violent attacks by ICE when trying to detain people on our streets and rip people from their cars or their homes. Earlier this year, Emmanuel Damas, a Haitian asylum seeker, died after being held in ICE custody at the Florence detention facility in Arizona. The Maricopa County Medical Examiner found that Mr. Damas' death stemmed from a severe infection connected to a serious dental disease. A toothache should never become a death sentence, not in Federal custody, not in Arizona, not anywhere in the United States, especially when someone is in the custody of the United States Government and completely dependent on that government for access to medical care. Mr. Damas' death raises serious concerns that remain unanswered. Why did he not have timely medical treatment? Why were his requests for care ignored? How did a treatable condition progress into a fatal medical emergency while he was in Federal custody? In March, my colleagues and I formally requested Mr. Damas' medical records and information about his request for treatment and a full accounting of the circumstances leading to his death. ICE responded in May, but once again failed to provide any real answers. ICE's response said doctors believed Mr. Damas was suffering from septic shock caused by pneumonia; but the medical examiner found his death stemmed from severe infection connected to a serious dental infection. When the Federal Government detains someone, it assumes responsibility for that person's health, safety, and well-being. Congress has a responsibility to make sure our government is meeting that obligation. Unfortunately, what happened to Mr. Damas is not isolated. There have been 56 people who have died in ICE detention since Trump took office last year. In Arizona and across the country, we continue to see reports of delayed medical treatment, inadequate care, deaths in custody, due process failures, and serious questions about conditions inside ICE and CBP facilities. Families deserve answers. Congress deserves the information necessary to conduct meaningful oversight. When failures occur, there must be accountability. Mr. Damas came to this country seeking asylum. While in Federal custody, he deserved humane treatment and appropriate medical care. His family deserves answers. We need to continue demanding that DHS and ICE provide records and information necessary to fully understand what happened in Florence to Mr. Damas and what they are doing to make sure it never happens again. We demand accountability. We demand justice for the individuals who have died and answers for the families and communities mourning their loss. Every day that passes, more people will die, more people will forever be scarred from their time in detention, and more families will be ripped apart. Remembrance is important, but remembrance without accountability is not enough.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Norma J. Torres

Democrat 7:30 p.m.

“I am sad that people in government custody went on hunger strikes. They were not happy. They were very sad. The government did not listen to them. The government did not ask why. The government did not try to help. The government forced them to eat. That is not good. That is very bad. That is not kind. That is not right. That is not fair. The government should listen. The government should ask why. The government should help. The government should be kind. The government should be fair. The government should be right. The government should be good. The government should be wise. The government should be brave. The government should be free. The government should be safe. The government should be home.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, inside an ICE detention center in Los Fresnos, Texas, people detained by our government went on hunger strikes to protest the conditions that they are being held in. Instead of asking why people in their custody were desperate enough to stop eating, ICE went to court for permission to force feed them. Guards restrain hunger strikers while medical staff inserted feeding tubes through their noses and into their stomachs. One asylum seeker was subject to forced feeding for nearly 8 months. Think about that. A person is saying: I am so desperate about the conditions you are holding me in that I am willing to stop eating. The government's response is: We are not going to address why you are protesting. We are going to physically stop you from protesting. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Pennsylvania (Ms. Dean).

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Madeleine Dean

Democrat 7:30 p.m.

“I don't like that people died in ICE custody. That is bad. Many people died. I am sad. I don't like ICE. ICE is bad. ICE hurts people. ICE should go away. I saw bad things in Texas. I saw bad things in New York. I saw bad things in Pennsylvania. People are sad. People are sick. People need help. ICE does not help. ICE is mean. ICE is not good. The government should stop ICE. The government should be kind. The government should be fair. The government should be right. The government should be good. The government should be wise. The government should be brave. The government should be free. The government should be safe. The government should be home.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, I thank the Representative holding this Special Order hour. Mr. Speaker, I rise with my colleagues to mark a grim milestone: 35 people died in ICE detention custody last year, the deadliest year in more than two decades. This year, there have been 24, with one more death reported just this afternoon. Ordinarily, this should spark some form of reckoning or investigation. Not under this administration. The President continues to flood American cities with thuggish ICE and CBP agents, acting as though the law does not apply to them, arresting more and more people who have committed few or no crimes. Since President Trump returned to office, ICE has arrested more than half a million people, 40 percent of whom do not have a criminal record. I have seen this firsthand, how this administration treats people in custody. I have seen the overcrowded holding facilities at Dilley, Texas--99 children without a toy or anything to play with. I have spoken to people who have been denied critical medications and have been denied legal aid. I saw a precious child whose mouth was so infected, it had turned green. Texas is not alone. In New York, The Washington Post detailed dozens of detainees held for days in rooms that usually hold no more than 12 for hours and hours. People are forced to sleep sitting up, to use bathrooms without any privacy, and others with serious health conditions, including tuberculosis, an ovarian cyst, and kidney failure, lacking proper care. In my home State of Pennsylvania, Mr. Speaker, at the Moshannon Valley Processing Center, a 32-year-old detainee died allegedly of suicide just 5 days after entering the ICE facility. His name is Chaofeng Ge, a Chinese national. His family wants answers. In February of last year, Daphy Michel, a 31-year-old woman suffering from untreated severe mental illness, with a significant language barrier, was dropped off by ICE at a bus stop in freezing winter temperatures. She was wearing summer clothes, and she froze to death. This is under this administration. Most recently, in the Philadelphia detention camp, Parady La, a 46- year-old citizen of Cambodia, died in ICE custody on January 9 while suffering from withdrawal, which he and his family detailed. In these conditions, conditions of deliberate neglect, deaths are not accidental. They are inevitable. Martin Luther King warned, and others too, that justice delayed is justice denied. For those who have died in ICE custody, waiting for their day in court, there can never be justice. For their families, there can never be peace. For our Nation, it is a failure for which we can never overcome. This is not a matter of just humanity and ethics. It is about who we are as Americans. Not here. Not in this America. I urge the administration to stop this illegal set of detentions and not let people pay with their liberty and their lives.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

Norma J. Torres

Democrat 7:30 p.m.

“A man died in ICE custody. That is bad. He was from Los Angeles. He lived in America for 28 years. He had a family. The government put him in a private prison. The prison is run by a company. The company is called GEO Group. The man died. ICE said they tried to help. Other people said ICE did not help. ICE called the man bad names. That is sad. The government should not do that.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, I close by bringing this back to my communities, the Inland Empire, because this is not happening somewhere far away. Since September of last year, four people have died while detained at Adelanto facility. On February 23 of this year, Jose Guadalupe Ramos-Solano died in ICE custody. He was a 52-year-old man. He had lived in this country for 28 years. He was a husband, a father, and his family is from Los Angeles. ICE arrested him and took him to the Adelanto facility, a facility run by the GEO Group, a private prison company. One month later, on March 25, he was dead. ICE says staff found him unconscious and unresponsive in his bunk and that they responded immediately. The men detained alongside him tell a much different story. They said he had been overheating. They said that he could not breathe. They said he pulled off his shirt because he felt like he was suffocating, and they said they tried to get help and that no one came until he was unconscious. Mr. Speaker, when ICE announced his death, the headline on the press release read: ``Criminal illegal alien passes away in ICE custody.'' That is how our government announced the death of a man who had built a life here for nearly three decades, not his name, not his age, not his family. The agency that had him in its care could not even bring themselves to call him by his name. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

View on ourcommons.ca ↗

What they said. What they meant.

Recent debates

Liberty and Justice for All

Norma J. Torres

Adriano Espaillat

Sylvia R. Garcia

Joaquin Castro

Norma J. Torres

Robert Menendez

Yvette D. Clarke

Norma J. Torres

Frank Pallone, Jr.

Linda T. Sanchez

Judy Chu

Pramila Jayapal

Becca Balint

Timothy M. Kennedy

Sam T. Liccardo

Adelita S. Grijalva

Norma J. Torres

Madeleine Dean

Norma J. Torres