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A U.S. Senate investigation has revealed dozens of credible reports of medical neglect and poor conditions in immigration detention centers across the country — detainees were deprived of insulin, left without medical care for days and forced to compete for clean water — increasing scrutiny of how the government oversees its vast detention system.
Senator released report Jon Ossoffa democrat from GeorgiaThe investigation is the second in a series of investigations examining alleged human rights abuses in the immigration detention system. It is based on an August review detailing abuse of children and pregnant women and is drawn from more than 500 reports of abuse and neglect collected between January and August.
The latest findings document more than 80 credible cases of medical neglect and widespread complaints of inadequate food and water. Senate investigators say this points to systemic failures in federal custody oversight.
The report cites accounts from detainees, lawyers, advocates, news reports, and at least one Department of Homeland Security Employees, describing delays in medical care that, in some cases, proved life-threatening. A detainee reportedly suffered a heart attack after complaining of chest pain that went untreated for several days. Others said that inhalers and asthma medications were withheld, or that detainees had to wait weeks for prescriptions to be filled.
According to the report, a Homeland Security staff member assigned to one detention site told investigators that “ambulances had to come almost every day”.
Ossoff said the findings reflect a deep failure of oversight within federal immigration detention.
,Americans Secure boundaries are highly sought after and deserved. “Americans also overwhelmingly oppose the abuse and neglect of detainees,” Ossoff told The Associated Press. “Every human being deserves dignity and humane treatment. That’s why I’ve spent years investigating and exposing abuses in prisons, jails and detention centers, and that’s why that work will continue.
Medical reports also described how one diabetic detainee went without glucose monitoring or insulin for two days and fainted before receiving medical attention and another detainee took months to receive medication to treat gastrointestinal problems.
Expired milk, dirty water, less food have been reported
The Senate investigation also identified persistent complaints about food and water, including evidence obtained from court filings, depositions, and interviews. prisoners Little food for adults, sometimes expired milk, and water that smelled foul or seemed to make children sick were described. At one facility in Texas, one teen said adults were forced to compete with children for clean water bottles when staff would only release a few at a time.
The Associated Press asked U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for comment on the report’s findings several times Wednesday and Thursday, but the agency did not respond. The Department of Homeland Security previously criticized Ossoff’s first report in August, saying allegations of detainee abuse were false and accusing him of trying to “score political points.”
Lawyers for some of those detained across the country said they had witnessed firsthand some of the issues with medical care and food.
Stephanie Alvarez-Jones, Southeast regional attorney for the National Immigration Project, said one of the organization’s clients was denied a scheduled medical device while detained at Angola’s Camp J facility in Louisiana over the past two months. The man in his 60s experienced stroke-like symptoms, including partial paralysis, and was eventually taken to hospital, where he was transferred to the intensive care unit for several days.
Doctors there gave him a walker to help him get around while he recovered, but Alvarez-Jones said that when he first returned the detention staff wouldn’t let him get a walker and placed him in a separation room.
“He still can’t walk on his own,” she said. “He was still paralyzed on his left side.” She added, “He was not able to get up, take his food, take a bath alone or use the bathroom without assistance. So he had to lie down in a dirty bedsheet because he was unable to get up.”
Alvarez-Jones said guards indicated to the man that they believed he was faking his illness. He was eventually given the option of remaining in the isolation cell and allowed a walker, or returning to the general captive population. He said he is relying on the help of other people in the general population to eat and use the bathroom after his recovery.
The Baltimore Field Office was investigated.
Amelia Degan, senior counsel at the Amica Center for Immigrant Rights, is working on the lawsuit against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Removal Operations Baltimore Field Office, as well as officials in charge of national immigration enforcement efforts.
Dagan said many of the organization’s clients have struggled to access medication at the Baltimore holding facility. Through the lawsuit, he said the government agency had to admit in court records that it had no food vendors to provide three meals a day or any on-site medical staff at the facility, which was initially supposed to hold detainees for only 12 hours a day.
But since January and various immigration enforcement actions, it has become more likely that detainees will be held in the Baltimore hold room for more than a week.
“What we started hearing very quickly, probably in February, was that the three meals a day they were being fed were incredibly inadequate,” Dagan said. “We would hear that sometimes it was a protein bar or sometimes it was just bread and water. It had very little nutritional value and very little variety. I mean, sometimes it was a military ration component, but just rice and beans, not a complete meal.”
Degan said detainees also have to ask for water bottles and are not always given them. The ICE office has taken the position that sinks attached to cell toilets have a continuous supply of water. But Dagan said detainees complained that the water in the sink tasted bad.
“This is 100% a problem of their own making,” he said of the officers. “These hold rooms were not used in this way before 2025. They are setting these quotas themselves, removing the discretion to release people and trying to arrest people in a way that is absolutely impractical… knowing full well that they do not have the capacity to hold these people.”