In the first years after birth, the human brain develops at a remarkable pace. Every second, more than a million new neural connections spring into being, shaping a person’s physical and emotional health for the rest of their life.

Since the Trump administration entered the White House last year, at least 500 babies and toddlers have spent some of that pivotal time in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

ICE has dramatically increased detentions of children aged 3 and under, holding 25 of them in custody on an average day between January 2025 and March of this year, according to a new analysis by The Marshall Project and MS NOW of records obtained by the Deportation Data Project, a group of academics and lawyers who collect and share federal immigration data. That number is 10 times higher than it was in the previous 12 months under former President Joe Biden. Back then, on an average day, fewer than three babies and toddlers were held at facilities across the country.

Parents in ICE detention have complained of substandard conditions that frequently left their young children sick, isolated and regressing in their physical and intellectual development.

ICE did not respond to a request for comment about the increase in detained young children. But in an emailed statement, an agency spokesperson said families with children receive appropriate food, water and medical care. In a separate statement, CoreCivic — the private company that operates the primary ICE facility used to detain families — echoed that its facilities were safe for infants and toddlers.

Marsha Griffin, a pediatrics professor and co-founder of the executive committee of the American Academy of Pediatrics’ Council on Immigrant Child and Family Health, called the period of infancy and toddlerhood “probably the most harmful time of their lives to have them in detention.”

“Our immigration system is breaking children,” she said.

Stores of a few of the children can be found within the article.

A Government Accountability Office (GAO) audit released today said evidence was destroyed or went missing regarding the death of Geraldo Lunas Campos, a federal immigration detainee whose death a medical examiner later ruled a homicide by asphyxiation.

The GAO reported that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) filed a “discrepancy report” in February noting that the private contractor that previously operated the Camp East Montana detention facility in Texas had failed to provide the agency with use-of-force and death reports regarding a January death of a detainee by use of force. The GAO report does not name the detainee, but the details match Lunas Campos, who died on January 3 after an altercation with guards at the camp.

“In addition, evidence associated with the incident was missing or destroyed,” the GAO report said.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) initially claimed that Lunas Campos had attempted to commit suicide and died during a struggle in which “guards were trying to save him.” However, the El Paso Medical Examiner’s Office ruled his death a homicide by asphyxiation. Multiple detainee witnesses told news outlets that guards choked Lunas Campos to death after he refused to stop asking for his medication.

“The officers entered, grabbed him,” one detainee told Zeteo, “and the last thing we could hear him say was: ‘They are choking me, they are choking me.’”

How about arresting pedophiles starting with those connected to Epstein?

I prefer foraging in the forest.

“We know they’re going to make a lot of money during these events,” Yolanda Fierro, a suite runner and union member who voted to authorize the strike, told the Guardian. “So what we want is a thank-you – gratitude from the company, giving us a good, equitable contract for increasing our wages, so we can survive out here in California because it’s very expensive here in this state.”

…

Workers also want greater guarantees for their safety. Unite Here Local 11 has demanded that Fifa refuse to allow ICE officers into the stadium during the World Cup.

The ICE demand is aimed to guarantee the safety of both foreign-born union members and spectators, Fiero said.

“They pay their taxes – they just want to be treated fairly and respectfully,” Fiero said of her colleagues. “We also do not want our guests from around the world to feel in fear of coming to our stadium and feel like ICE is going to take them because they’re not from our country.”

Last month, the union and the American Civil Liberties Union of southern California asked the attorney general, Rob Bonta, to investigate Fifa’s data-collection practices, saying that Fifa was collecting workers’ sensitive personal details, requiring them to waive their California data-protection rights, and then handing that information over to the Department of Homeland Security.

“These workers are being put in an impossible bind, where they are being forced to choose between their livelihoods and handing over their most personal sensitive information,” the letter reads. “Workers in California should not be forced to make this choice.”

“We know they’re going to make a lot of money during these events,” Yolanda Fierro, a suite runner and union member who voted to authorize the strike, told the Guardian. “So what we want is a thank-you – gratitude from the company, giving us a good, equitable contract for increasing our wages, so we can survive out here in California because it’s very expensive here in this state.”

…

Workers also want greater guarantees for their safety. Unite Here Local 11 has demanded that Fifa refuse to allow ICE officers into the stadium during the World Cup.

The ICE demand is aimed to guarantee the safety of both foreign-born union members and spectators, Fiero said.

“They pay their taxes – they just want to be treated fairly and respectfully,” Fiero said of her colleagues. “We also do not want our guests from around the world to feel in fear of coming to our stadium and feel like ICE is going to take them because they’re not from our country.”

Last month, the union and the American Civil Liberties Union of southern California asked the attorney general, Rob Bonta, to investigate Fifa’s data-collection practices, saying that Fifa was collecting workers’ sensitive personal details, requiring them to waive their California data-protection rights, and then handing that information over to the Department of Homeland Security.

“These workers are being put in an impossible bind, where they are being forced to choose between their livelihoods and handing over their most personal sensitive information,” the letter reads. “Workers in California should not be forced to make this choice.”

The Thirteenth Amendment prohibits slavery, except “as a punishment for crime.” But people in immigration detention haven’t been convicted of anything—and are still being forced to work for nothing.

For the past several weeks, hundreds of detainees at Delaney Hall, an immigration detention center in Newark, New Jersey, have been on a labor and hunger strike. Participants in the strike are refusing to perform their work assignments or eat meals in protest of what they describe, in a series of handwritten letters smuggled out of the facility, as “unlawful and forced detention” and “inhumane treatment” that violates their constitutional rights. Among the myriad “injustices and irregularities” named in the letters are rotten food riddled with worms; persistent “unresolved issues” with bathrooms in “terrible and inhumane” condition; and detainees being forced to work for practically pennies or, more often, for no pay at all.

Delaney Hall was the first immigration detention center to open during President Donald Trump’s second term in office. And like almost all immigration detention facilities, Delaney is owned and operated by a private prison corporation. GEO Group, a company valued at approximately $3.3 billion, signed a 15-year contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement in February 2025, providing ICE with the facility and “support services” like security, maintenance, and food services, in exchange for over $60 million annually.

But it is the detainees—not GEO Group—who actually do that work.

…

Forcing immigrant detainees to work for their captors isn’t just exploitative. It’s unconstitutional. The Thirteenth Amendment explicitly prohibits slavery and indentured servitude, except “as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted.” But immigration detention is a form of civil confinement. People held in detention centers are simply waiting—behind bars—for the resolution of their immigration cases. This is punitive in practice, but not in law, as they are incarcerated, but not in prison. Only 12 percent of the people who have been detained at Delaney Hall since it opened have ever been convicted of anything.

…

The strike at Delaney Hall is not an isolated incident. In recent weeks, hundreds of other immigration detainees across the country have participated in similar strikes. But Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin told reporters last week that “only a handful” of detainees at Delaney were refusing to eat, and it was because they wanted “ethnic” food.

In their letters, the migrants write that GEO Group is failing to “meet the basic conditions necessary to protect our health and our lives.” And as one recently-released Delaney detainee quipped, in an interview with The Guardian last week, “If we are going to be detained for months so this company can profit, they should at least provide a better service.”

Since reentering the White House, Trump has waged an aggressive campaign to detain and deport people of color—building more detention infrastructure, arresting more people, and releasing fewer. And as the immigration detention population grows, so too does the nation’s Thirteenth Amendment crisis.

The Thirteenth Amendment prohibits slavery, except “as a punishment for crime.” But people in immigration detention haven’t been convicted of anything—and are still being forced to work for nothing.

For the past several weeks, hundreds of detainees at Delaney Hall, an immigration detention center in Newark, New Jersey, have been on a labor and hunger strike. Participants in the strike are refusing to perform their work assignments or eat meals in protest of what they describe, in a series of handwritten letters smuggled out of the facility, as “unlawful and forced detention” and “inhumane treatment” that violates their constitutional rights. Among the myriad “injustices and irregularities” named in the letters are rotten food riddled with worms; persistent “unresolved issues” with bathrooms in “terrible and inhumane” condition; and detainees being forced to work for practically pennies or, more often, for no pay at all.

Delaney Hall was the first immigration detention center to open during President Donald Trump’s second term in office. And like almost all immigration detention facilities, Delaney is owned and operated by a private prison corporation. GEO Group, a company valued at approximately $3.3 billion, signed a 15-year contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement in February 2025, providing ICE with the facility and “support services” like security, maintenance, and food services, in exchange for over $60 million annually.

But it is the detainees—not GEO Group—who actually do that work.

…

Forcing immigrant detainees to work for their captors isn’t just exploitative. It’s unconstitutional. The Thirteenth Amendment explicitly prohibits slavery and indentured servitude, except “as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted.” But immigration detention is a form of civil confinement. People held in detention centers are simply waiting—behind bars—for the resolution of their immigration cases. This is punitive in practice, but not in law, as they are incarcerated, but not in prison. Only 12 percent of the people who have been detained at Delaney Hall since it opened have ever been convicted of anything.

…

The strike at Delaney Hall is not an isolated incident. In recent weeks, hundreds of other immigration detainees across the country have participated in similar strikes. But Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin told reporters last week that “only a handful” of detainees at Delaney were refusing to eat, and it was because they wanted “ethnic” food.

In their letters, the migrants write that GEO Group is failing to “meet the basic conditions necessary to protect our health and our lives.” And as one recently-released Delaney detainee quipped, in an interview with The Guardian last week, “If we are going to be detained for months so this company can profit, they should at least provide a better service.”

Since reentering the White House, Trump has waged an aggressive campaign to detain and deport people of color—building more detention infrastructure, arresting more people, and releasing fewer. And as the immigration detention population grows, so too does the nation’s Thirteenth Amendment crisis.

A Georgian immigrant who officials said died last week in Immigrant and Customs Enforcement custody is the 50th person to die in ICE detention during the second Trump administration.

Mamuka Artmeladze, 43, died on June 4 at the Winn Correctional Center in Louisiana, according to an agency notification sent to lawmakers.

“Yesterday, I was notified of the 50th death in ICE custody since Trump returned to office,” Jayapal (D-Wash.)—the ranking member of the House Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement—said on social media. “This is unprecedented and further proof that ICE and their private, for-profit prison contractors should not be sent another cent of taxpayer dollars. There must be accountability.”

According to ICE’s public database, 51 people have died while detained by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agency during Trump’s second term, including two people who were killed in a sniper attack on an ICE administrative and processing center in Dallas. At least 10 of the deaths were men who killed themselves, according to an Associated Press investigation published late last month.

ICE recently announced it would stop reporting the deaths of people recently released from ICE detention. The reporting policy, enacted in 2021, was meant to assure accountability and prevent the agency from offloading severely ill detainees.

Many of the deaths were preventable, say experts who point to systemic understaffing and DHS policy choices that weaken detainee care and employee oversight.

Jayapal’s call comes as ICE detainees across the nation are resisting abuse in concentration centers across the nation, through hunger strikes and other civil disobedience, as well as via lawsuits.

Hundreds of detainees at Delaney Hall in Newark, New Jersey—which is operated by prison profiteer GEO Group—are participating in a hunger and labor strike over unsanitary conditions, inedible food, poor medical care, and prolonged detention, while federal agents have attacked people outside the facility including protesters and a sitting US senator.

Similar strikes and other acts of resistance are either ongoing or recently occurred at Adelanto Processing Center and its Desert View Annex in California, North Lake Processing Center in Michigan, Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Pennsylvania—all run by GEO Group—and other lockups. Detainees who participate in hunger strikes or speak to reporters say they have been placed in solitary confinement and subjected to other retaliation.

Despite—some critics say because of—reports of widespread abuses, DHS recently shut down its Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman (OIDO), which was created by an act of Congress signed into law during Trump’s first term amid rampant systemic abuse of migrants including detainee deaths, family separation, and severe overcrowding. OIDO had the power to receive detainee complaints, investigate alleged abuse or misconduct, inspect detention facilities, and report systemic problems to DHS leaders and Congress.

A Georgian immigrant who officials said died last week in Immigrant and Customs Enforcement custody is the 50th person to die in ICE detention during the second Trump administration.

Mamuka Artmeladze, 43, died on June 4 at the Winn Correctional Center in Louisiana, according to an agency notification sent to lawmakers.

“Yesterday, I was notified of the 50th death in ICE custody since Trump returned to office,” Jayapal (D-Wash.)—the ranking member of the House Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement—said on social media. “This is unprecedented and further proof that ICE and their private, for-profit prison contractors should not be sent another cent of taxpayer dollars. There must be accountability.”

According to ICE’s public database, 51 people have died while detained by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agency during Trump’s second term, including two people who were killed in a sniper attack on an ICE administrative and processing center in Dallas. At least 10 of the deaths were men who killed themselves, according to an Associated Press investigation published late last month.

ICE recently announced it would stop reporting the deaths of people recently released from ICE detention. The reporting policy, enacted in 2021, was meant to assure accountability and prevent the agency from offloading severely ill detainees.

Many of the deaths were preventable, say experts who point to systemic understaffing and DHS policy choices that weaken detainee care and employee oversight.

Jayapal’s call comes as ICE detainees across the nation are resisting abuse in concentration centers across the nation, through hunger strikes and other civil disobedience, as well as via lawsuits.

Hundreds of detainees at Delaney Hall in Newark, New Jersey—which is operated by prison profiteer GEO Group—are participating in a hunger and labor strike over unsanitary conditions, inedible food, poor medical care, and prolonged detention, while federal agents have attacked people outside the facility including protesters and a sitting US senator.

Similar strikes and other acts of resistance are either ongoing or recently occurred at Adelanto Processing Center and its Desert View Annex in California, North Lake Processing Center in Michigan, Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Pennsylvania—all run by GEO Group—and other lockups. Detainees who participate in hunger strikes or speak to reporters say they have been placed in solitary confinement and subjected to other retaliation.

Despite—some critics say because of—reports of widespread abuses, DHS recently shut down its Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman (OIDO), which was created by an act of Congress signed into law during Trump’s first term amid rampant systemic abuse of migrants including detainee deaths, family separation, and severe overcrowding. OIDO had the power to receive detainee complaints, investigate alleged abuse or misconduct, inspect detention facilities, and report systemic problems to DHS leaders and Congress.

“Yesterday, I was notified of the 50th death in ICE custody since Trump returned to office,” Jayapal (D-Wash.)—the ranking member of the House Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement—said on social media. “This is unprecedented and further proof that ICE and their private, for-profit prison contractors should not be sent another cent of taxpayer dollars. There must be accountability.”

According to ICE’s public database, 51 people have died while detained by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agency during Trump’s second term, including two people who were killed in a sniper attack on an ICE administrative and processing center in Dallas. At least 10 of the deaths were men who killed themselves, according to an Associated Press investigation published late last month.

ICE recently announced it would stop reporting the deaths of people recently released from ICE detention. The reporting policy, enacted in 2021, was meant to assure accountability and prevent the agency from offloading severely ill detainees.

Many of the deaths were preventable, say experts who point to systemic understaffing and DHS policy choices that weaken detainee care and employee oversight.

Jayapal’s call comes as ICE detainees across the nation are resisting abuse in concentration centers across the nation, through hunger strikes and other civil disobedience, as well as via lawsuits.

Hundreds of detainees at Delaney Hall in Newark, New Jersey—which is operated by prison profiteer GEO Group—are participating in a hunger and labor strike over unsanitary conditions, inedible food, poor medical care, and prolonged detention, while federal agents have attacked people outside the facility including protesters and a sitting US senator.

Similar strikes and other acts of resistance are either ongoing or recently occurred at Adelanto Processing Center and its Desert View Annex in California, North Lake Processing Center in Michigan, Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Pennsylvania—all run by GEO Group—and other lockups. Detainees who participate in hunger strikes or speak to reporters say they have been placed in solitary confinement and subjected to other retaliation.

Despite—some critics say because of—reports of widespread abuses, DHS recently shut down its Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman (OIDO), which was created by an act of Congress signed into law during Trump’s first term amid rampant systemic abuse of migrants including detainee deaths, family separation, and severe overcrowding. OIDO had the power to receive detainee complaints, investigate alleged abuse or misconduct, inspect detention facilities, and report systemic problems to DHS leaders and Congress.

Its more like when a minority insults a fascist white supremacist who hates women, rapes children and buried his ex wife on his golfcourse.

Senators voted 52-47 to pass the $70 billion legislation to fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol for the next three years, through the end of Trump’s term, after Democrats blocked the money for months. The bill will now head to the House, which is expected to take it up next week.

The final vote came just before 5 a.m., after Republicans narrowly defeated multiple attempts by members of both parties to add language to the bill that would permanently ban Trump’s settlement fund for allies who believe they’ve been politically persecuted.

More than two weeks since detainees began a hunger and labor strike inside Delaney Hall—and their allies outside answered with near-daily protests—it’s still incredibly difficult to find out what’s going on inside the facility. Often, family members find their visits rescheduled or canceled, and journalists have not made it in, either.

…

“They told me that if I were to speak to any detainees, the oversight tour would immediately be cut off and stopped. This is impeding my ability to lawfully do the oversight that I’m legally allowed to do, and I told them I thought this was a deep breach of my responsibilities and what the American people are demanding.”

What he was able to see was disturbing.

As Kim walked past the women’s unit, he said, he saw a group of women frantically waving their arms and pointing at someone curled up on a bed in pain. “They’re just frantic and waving and pointing, and I saw the woman curled up on the bed. I asked, ‘What is happening here?’” The guards, Kim said, didn’t answer. (GEO Group and ICE did not respond to requests for comment.)

“They continue to have only one full-time doctor here for hundreds of detainees, many of whom have significant medical concerns,” Kim said. At this point, there are about 600 people jailed in Delaney Hall, a thousand-bed facility which has faced accusations of inadequate medical care, wormy food and abusive guards.

On his oversight visit, Kim asked the guards why detainees’ video calls are being restricted. “’We’ll get back to you,’” he said the guards replied. He asked after specific detained people, whose families had asked him for help. Again, he said, the guards responded, “’We’ll get back to you.’”

He asked about one detained woman who has been hospitalized for several weeks. “They aren’t telling her family where she is, which hospital she’s in. They’re saying it’s a security problem,” Kim said. Guards told the family to file a Freedom of Information Act request to find out where she is, he said. “Can you imagine if your loved one was in a hospital and you don’t know what hospital they’re in, and then you’re told to just file some bureaucratic papers, and cross your fingers that they’re going to get back to you?”

“That’s the stuff that just pisses me off about this.  I was here to get answers for these family members that I talked with earlier today, and I didn’t get them.”

Senators voted 52-47 to pass the $70 billion legislation to fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol for the next three years, through the end of Trump’s term, after Democrats blocked the money for months. The bill will now head to the House, which is expected to take it up next week.

The final vote came just before 5 a.m., after Republicans narrowly defeated multiple attempts by members of both parties to add language to the bill that would permanently ban Trump’s settlement fund for allies who believe they’ve been politically persecuted.

More than two weeks since detainees began a hunger and labor strike inside Delaney Hall—and their allies outside answered with near-daily protests—it’s still incredibly difficult to find out what’s going on inside the facility. Often, family members find their visits rescheduled or canceled, and journalists have not made it in, either.

…

“They told me that if I were to speak to any detainees, the oversight tour would immediately be cut off and stopped. This is impeding my ability to lawfully do the oversight that I’m legally allowed to do, and I told them I thought this was a deep breach of my responsibilities and what the American people are demanding.”

What he was able to see was disturbing.

As Kim walked past the women’s unit, he said, he saw a group of women frantically waving their arms and pointing at someone curled up on a bed in pain. “They’re just frantic and waving and pointing, and I saw the woman curled up on the bed. I asked, ‘What is happening here?’” The guards, Kim said, didn’t answer. (GEO Group and ICE did not respond to requests for comment.)

“They continue to have only one full-time doctor here for hundreds of detainees, many of whom have significant medical concerns,” Kim said. At this point, there are about 600 people jailed in Delaney Hall, a thousand-bed facility which has faced accusations of inadequate medical care, wormy food and abusive guards.

On his oversight visit, Kim asked the guards why detainees’ video calls are being restricted. “’We’ll get back to you,’” he said the guards replied. He asked after specific detained people, whose families had asked him for help. Again, he said, the guards responded, “’We’ll get back to you.’”

He asked about one detained woman who has been hospitalized for several weeks. “They aren’t telling her family where she is, which hospital she’s in. They’re saying it’s a security problem,” Kim said. Guards told the family to file a Freedom of Information Act request to find out where she is, he said. “Can you imagine if your loved one was in a hospital and you don’t know what hospital they’re in, and then you’re told to just file some bureaucratic papers, and cross your fingers that they’re going to get back to you?”

“That’s the stuff that just pisses me off about this.  I was here to get answers for these family members that I talked with earlier today, and I didn’t get them.”

They were blocking the driveway in protest of the concentration camp. The car kept driving foward.

They stood their ground for as long as they could.