Democrats on the U.S. House Committee on Homeland Security held a forum in Newark on Wednesday highlighting the grim medical conditions facing detainees inside Delaney Hall detention center following weeks of national scrutiny.
The facility, operated by the prison contractor GEO Group through a 15-year, $1 billion contract, has become a flash point for the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement agenda in recent weeks as detainees described harsh conditions and protesters clashed with authorities outside.
“For years, we have been raising the alarm about what’s happening inside the Delaney Hall. Now, the rest of the country is seeing it too, all because of the courage of the people in detention who are choosing to speak out about what is happening inside,” Rep. Rob Menendez (D-NJ) said.
Rep. Analilia Mejia (D-NJ) shared that while visiting the facility she had heard complaints on overcrowding and sanitation issues but she was most concerned about the lack of medical care, which she said amounted to “medical abuse.”
She described meeting with a diabetic detainee who said she was only receiving a quarter of her medications. “It was so frightening, because when I went to see my constituent after a couple weeks of detention, I could physically see that she was unwell,” Mejia told the committee.
Detainees inside Delaney Hall, an ICE detention facility in Newark, bang on windows as protesters rally outside, May 24, 2026. Credit: Gwynne Hogan/THE CITY
The testimony echoed the findings in an investigation by The City Reporter published this week which found that dozens of detainees alleged in lawsuits that they were illegally denied appropriate medical care. Immigrants are guaranteed access to care while detained under the due process clauses of the Constitution.
The City Reporter reviewed the medical records of several detainees, including a construction worker named Marcelo who was hospitalized twice for chest pains after a history of heart attacks. Hospital records showed the facility delayed sending him to the emergency room and likely took him off necessary medications.
A detainee named Haruna who spoke with The City Reporter while still detained at Delaney Hall said that despite receiving some treatment he is still suffering from gastrointestinal bleeding.
“I’m sick. I tell them the same things, but they don’t take it to be something serious,” he said. Detained for nearly a year in Delaney Hall, he said, “It’s like hell to me now.”
GEO Group and the DHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
“It is a longstanding practice to provide comprehensive medical care from the moment an alien enters ICE custody,” a DHS spokesperson previously told The City Reporter. “This is the best healthcare many aliens have received in their entire lives.”
Federal agents scuffle with protesters outside of the Delaney Hall immigration detention center in Newark, New Jersey, May 28, 2026. Credit: Gwynne Hogan/The City Reporter
On Wednesday, Viri Martinez, the deputy director of strategy for the New Jersey Alliance for Immigrant Justice, told the committee about a woman who was recently released from Delaney Hall who told her she was denied access to her treatments for conditions including glaucoma, anemia and high blood pressure. Instead, she was only given Tylenol.
“Geo Group is continuously, continuously at fault for medical neglect, and that’s why Delaney Hall must be shut down,” Martinez said.
Mayor Ras Baraka of Newark cited the city’s ongoing legal dispute with the facility as well as the wide range of complaints as enough evidence to close it down.
“If this was a nursing home that did not follow the rules of the local government or the state government that had claims of inhumane treatment, poor and bad food, people passing away, women who have had miscarriages in the place, we would have already moved to shut it down,” he told the committee.
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