Emergency crews have been dispatched to the Dilley Immigration Processing Center at least 11 times since mid-September to treat children in medical distress, according to EMS call logs and 911 audio obtained by NBC News. Staff inside the family detention center repeatedly called for emergency medical help for young children and pregnant women between October 2025 and February 2026, as detailed in 911 recordings reviewed by KSAT and obtained by ABC News. The calls involved children with symptoms such as respiratory distress, fever, lethargy, allergic reactions, leg fractures, low oxygen levels, and seizures. In at least three cases, children were transferred more than an hour away to a specialized pediatric hospital in San Antonio. In one case, a 22-month-old in respiratory distress was so serious that first responders wanted to fly him by helicopter but couldn't due to bad weather, according to the records.
The Dilley facility, run by private prison firm CoreCivic, was originally opened by the Obama administration in 2014, scaled back by the Biden administration in 2021, and closed three years later before being reopened by President Donald Trump’s administration last spring. The number of detained families at Dilley has risen sharply since last fall, with about 5,600 immigrants, more than half of them children, detained since it reopened last year, according to major media reports. More than 300 people, including 77 children, are currently locked up at Dilley, advocates and lawmakers say, though the number of people in detention dropped last month to roughly 100 from January’s average daily population of more than 900. The federal government does not publicly disclose information about children in immigration custody, making independent verification difficult.
Specific cases highlight the human toll of these policies. A young Ecuadorian mother and her 7-year-old daughter were detained at Dilley for a month before being released to a migrant shelter in Laredo, while her husband was deported to Ecuador soon after they were taken into custody. Liam Conejo Ramos and his father were sent to Dilley and released after 10 days when members of Congress and a judge intervened, after the five-year-old grew ill and became lethargic in custody. Christian Hinojosa and her 13-year-old son were held at Dilley for more than four months before being released this month, illustrating how ICE has been holding hundreds of children at Dilley, many for months. The government is holding many children at Dilley beyond the 20-day limit set by a longstanding court order, and many detainees have lived in the U.S. for several years, with roots in neighborhoods, workplaces, and schools, according to lawyers and other observers.
There has been medical care that has been denied and that in some ways these folks are treated like animals.
Olivia, a 19-year-old asylum seeker from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, has been at Dilley for more than four months, according to major media reports. She was apprehended with her mother and two younger siblings in November, then separated, reunited at Dilley, and separated again after ICE agreed to release them but not her. Olivia and her family fled political persecution in DRC, stopped over in South America, and completed their journey to the U.S. in December 2022, but her brother Manuel drowned when he was eight years old during the journey. She was living in Maine with her family awaiting a final decision on their asylum case before it was denied and they decided to seek asylum in Canada, leading to her separation at the northern border because she was 19, legally an adult, and moved between detention centers while wearing an orange jumpsuit.
A Venezuelan mother of two, referred to as Flora, was allegedly trafficked to the U.S. and has been unlawfully detained by ICE, her lawyers claim. Flora has applications in process for asylum and a visa for victims of trafficking, and she was arrested at a routine check-in with authorities in January and separated from her two children, aged 18 months and four. Her alleged trafficker, who allegedly lured her to the U.S. under false promises, is free, according to a habeas petition, and Flora allegedly faced repeated rape, forced unpaid labor, and abuse from her trafficker in the U.S. She escaped her alleged trafficker last year after calling the police and was helped to relocate to the east coast. The alleged trafficker traveled to Maryland and found the church where Flora had taken refuge, and a restraining order was granted by Maryland authorities.
Systemic failures in ICE's child welfare policies are evident in multiple reports. A 22-year-old woman was five months pregnant when deported to Honduras and said ICE never asked about her two-year-old daughter left behind, according to a report from the Women’s Refugee Commission and Physicians for Human Rights. Similarly, a 27-year-old woman arrested at a traffic light said ICE never asked about her children, including whether she could bring her 11-year-old son when deported. The report indicates that ICE has failed to follow its own policies requiring officers to ask people they arrest about their children, and the Trump administration revised Biden-era guidelines for detained parents last summer, making it so ICE will only support children joining deported parents if 'operationally feasible.' More than half of parents interviewed in Honduras said ICE never asked about their children at any point during arrest, detention, or removal, despite ICE still being required to ask anyone they arrest if they have children and allow parents to decide what happens to them if deported.
The emergency calls point to potential missed opportunities for earlier medical intervention and that detention is fundamentally incompatible with children's health.
A particularly distressing case involves a young father who waited five months for his 3-year-old daughter’s release from federal custody after she crossed the border with her mother. The girl suffered alleged sexual abuse at the foster home where she was placed after immigration officials separated her from her mother, and the father learned of the abuse only when he turned to the courts as a last resort. Court documents state that the girl said she was sexually abused by an older child in foster care in Harlingen, Texas, and the older child accused of abuse was removed from the foster program. The abuse allegations were reported to local law enforcement, according to Lauren Fisher Flores.
Democratic members of Congress have raised concerns that the Dilley Immigration Processing Center is growing 'more secretive' under new DHS leadership. When Rep. Joaquin Castro and Rep. Greg Casar visited Dilley, employees read scripts commanded by ICE leadership in Washington, D.C., according to Castro. According to The Independent - Main, Joaquin Castro described Dilley operating with a 'creepy secrecy' under DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin. Nearly 600 immigrant children have been held at Dilley with inadequate food and medical care, often beyond court-mandated limits, as noted in court documents.
Meenu Batra, a Texas court interpreter, was arrested by ICE after living in the U.S. for more than 35 years, and she is the only licensed Punjabi, Hindi, and Urdu court interpreter in Texas. Batra was stopped at Harlingen international airport, put in handcuffs, and transferred to El Valle detention facility, after fleeing Indian pogroms against Sikhs in Punjab and arriving in the U.S. in 1991. In 2000, an immigration judge granted Batra a 'withholding of removal' to India, but her lawyer worries the government plans to send her to a 'third country' where she has never been. Batra alleged she was detained without food or water for 24 hours and denied medication for several days, and she claimed officers made her pose for photographs with her hands behind her back to give the impression she was still handcuffed and said the images were 'for social media.'
Dilley operates with a 'creepy secrecy' under DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin.
Official responses have sought to downplay the severity of the situation. DHS Chief Medical Officer Dr. Sean Conley stated that allegations of denied medical care in ICE custody are false and that detainees receive timely and appropriate medical care. A spokesperson for CoreCivic said no child 'has been denied medical treat,' though the statement was incomplete in the source. ICE confirmed at least two measles cases inside the Dilley facility last month, and parents of a toddler with low oxygen refused to be transported, according to research. A 2-month-old boy named Juan Nicolás was taken to a hospital with a respiratory illness after choking on vomit and later deported to Mexico, his mother said, and a two-year-old girl was hospitalized, with her parents saying she was denied medicine as her health deteriorated at Dilley.
Reactions to these conditions have included legal challenges and policy critiques. Photos circulated showing ICE agents in Minneapolis detaining a 5-year-old boy wearing a bunny hat and carrying a Spiderman backpack, sparking public outrage. According to www.ksat.com, Joaquin Castro described medical care being denied and people being treated like animals, while according to www.nbcnews.com, Lara Jones described the emergency calls pointing to potential missed opportunities for earlier medical intervention and that detention is fundamentally incompatible with children's health. Roughly 6,200 children have been placed in ICE detention since the beginning of Donald Trump’s second term, highlighting the scale of the issue.
Several key unknowns remain unresolved. It is unclear what specific actions or policies have led to the alleged secrecy and scripted responses at the Dilley facility under DHS leadership, or how many children are currently detained beyond the 20-day court-mandated limit and what legal justifications exist for these extended detentions. The status of investigations into the alleged sexual abuse of the 3-year-old girl in foster care and the possible kidnapping case involving U.S. citizen ChongLy 'Scott' Thao is also unknown, as are the outcomes of asylum and trafficking visa applications for individuals like Flora and Olivia. Furthermore, specific measures to address the medical emergencies and inadequate care reported at Dilley, beyond official denials, have not been detailed publicly.