The Dilley Immigration Processing Center in Texas has been reopened by the Trump administration and holds hundreds of families, including children, often beyond the 20-day limit set by court order, according to multiple reports. About 5,600 immigrants, more than half of them children, have been detained at the facility since it reopened last year, according to multiple reports. However, other figures indicate a lower current population: in January, the average daily population was more than 900, and currently it is more than 300, including 77 children. The number of people in ICE custody has exploded since Trump returned to the White House, with more than 60,000 people being held, according to multiple reports. The compound first opened during Barack Obama's administration and was reopened under Trump after being closed under Biden, according to multiple reports.
Individual cases illustrate the scope of detention at Dilley. A 29-year-old Ecuadorian mother and her 7-year-old daughter were detained at Dilley after being transferred from Minnesota, according to multiple reports. A 5-year-old boy named Liam Conejo Ramos was detained by ICE in Minneapolis and sent to Dilley, according to multiple reports. Christian Hinojosa, an immigrant from Mexico, and her 13-year-old son were held at Dilley for more than four months, according to multiple reports. Olivia, a 19-year-old asylum seeker from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, has been detained at Dilley for more than four months, according to multiple reports.
Medical emergencies and inadequate care have been reported at Dilley. Emergency crews have been dispatched to Dilley nearly a dozen times over the last six months for medical emergencies, according to call logs reviewed by ProPublica and NBC News. Children at Dilley experienced respiratory distress, seizures, low oxygen levels, broken bones, and severe fever, according to call logs and medical records. In at least three cases, children were transferred to a pediatric hospital in San Antonio, according to call logs. Nearly 600 immigrant children have been held at Dilley with inadequate food and medical care, according to court documents. 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 call logs. Parents of a toddler with low oxygen refused to be transported, according to call logs. A 2-month-old named Juan Nicolás was taken to a hospital with a respiratory illness after his mother said he choked on his own vomit; the family was later deported to Mexico, according to multiple reports. ICE confirmed at least two measles cases inside the facility last month, according to an ICE spokesperson. A CoreCivic spokesperson stated that no child has been denied medical treatment.
A Venezuelan mother of two, referred to as Flora, was allegedly trafficked to the US and has been unlawfully detained by ICE, according to her lawyers. Flora was arrested at a routine check-in in January and separated from her two children, according to multiple reports. Flora's alleged trafficker is free, according to a habeas petition.
TSA staff alerted ICE to a Guatemalan mother and her 9-year-old daughter before their arrest at San Francisco International Airport, according to government documents obtained by The New York Times. Angelina Lopez-Jimenez and her daughter Wendy Godinez-Jimenez were arrested at San Francisco airport after TSA flagged their names, according to multiple reports.
A 22-year-old pregnant woman was deported to Honduras without being asked about her children, according to a report from the Women's Refugee Commission and Physicians for Human Rights. ICE has failed to follow its own policies requiring officers to ask detainees about their children, according to the same report.
A 3-year-old girl was allegedly sexually abused while in foster care after being separated from her mother by immigration officials, according to court documents and the girl's father. The girl's father, a legal permanent resident, was not informed of the abuse for some time, according to multiple reports.
Meenu Batra, a certified court interpreter, was arrested by ICE at Harlingen Airport and claims she was treated like a criminal, according to Batra. Batra has withholding of removal status and has been in the US since she was a teenager, according to multiple reports.
The Trump administration sent a government plane to Cuba to return a 10-year-old child at the center of a custody fight involving gender identity, according to multiple reports. The child's parent, Rose Inessa-Ethington, a transgender woman, is accused of taking the child to Cuba without permission, according to a criminal complaint.
Democratic lawmakers report that the Dilley facility is growing more secretive under new DHS leadership, according to Rep. Joaquin Castro and Rep. Greg Casar.
ChongLy 'Scott' Thao, a US citizen, was arrested by ICE in St Paul, Minnesota, in what local authorities are investigating as possible kidnapping and false imprisonment, according to multiple reports. ICE officers broke down Thao's door without a warrant, according to his family. DHS stated that ICE agents were executing a warrant and that Thao refused to be fingerprinted or identified, according to a DHS spokesperson.
The Dilley facility is run by private prison firm CoreCivic, according to multiple reports. The exact number of children currently detained at Dilley and their average length of stay remain unclear. The status of the habeas petition for Flora, the Venezuelan mother allegedly trafficked, is unknown. The outcome of the investigation into the alleged sexual abuse of the 3-year-old girl in foster care has not been disclosed.