Federal judges have barred Donald Trump’s administration from turning away members of Congress who show up at immigration detention centers, where detainees have alleged inhumane conditions, lack of access to lawyers and lengthy stays inside prison-like cells.
But on their latest visit, lawmakers were handed a new memo that requires them to “specifically identify” who they’re meeting with — and give at least a two-day notice.
“The best, most transparent form of oversight is when you don't announce that you’re coming,” Democratic Rep. Mike Levin told The Independent after he was barred from speaking with detainees inside California’s Otay Mesa Detention Center near the U.S.-Mexico border on Monday.
Levin and Rep. Sara Jacobs were allowed inside the facility but blocked from speaking with any of the hundreds of people detained inside.
“If the public is in the dark, the American people don’t know what’s happening inside these facilities, and you don’t allow unannounced and fully transparent congressional oversight, it just adds to the distrust that people have,” Levin said.
Levin said he texted the regional ICE director roughly one hour before arriving at the facility. “It’s impossible to totally clean up a facility of that size in less than an hour,” he said.
When lawmakers asked to visit detainees, detention center staff gave them a memo from ICE acting director Todd Lyons, dated May 11, which called such visits “disruptive and resource-intensive” that are “pulling officers and agents away from their law enforcement responsibilities and security posts.”
At least 900 detainees at three large detention centers have signed up to meet with members of Congress, according to ICE.
“Such requests are impractical and require substantial time and resources to adjudicate,” Lyons wrote. “ICE cannot accommodate congressional meetings with hundreds of detainees without significant disruption to facility operations.”
There are more than 1,000 detainees at Otay Mesa, where detainees spend an average of 130 days, according to figures provided to Levin’s office. California officials have sued for access to the facility, and detainees have complained about sleeping on floors on plastic pads and being fed small portions of inedible food.
During his visit, Levin tasted the food and water (“It wasn’t anything to write home about, but it wasn’t terrible”) and inspected cells and the facility’s forms for medical care and contacting members of Congress. But not being able to hear from detainees themselves obstructs lawmakers’ oversight authority, he said.
They’ll keep trying.
”If they turn us away at the door, if they block a conversation we’re entitled to have, we’re going to make sure that the courts know about it,” he told The Independent.
“And I think showing up is the whole point. So stopping now would tell ICE that they’re off the hook with regard to oversight.”
The Independent has requested comment from DHS.
Lawsuits across the country allege brutal conditions inside ICE detention centers, which the agency says are designed to be “non-punitive” facilities. Yet many of those facilities rely on the same tools and tactics inside prisons and jails holding people with criminal records.
More than 30 people died in ICE detention in 2025, the deadliest year for ICE detainees in more than two decades. At least 18 people have died in ICE custody so far this year.
Lawsuits also alleged unsanitary cells, a lack of access to legal counsel, outbreaks of measles in at least two facilities, and the hospitalizations and alleged medical mistreatment of children inside a sprawling camp that is holding a growing number of immigrant families.
Homeland Security officials have repeatedly defended the level of care provided to detained immigrants while also claiming that “detention is a choice” as officials urge immigrants to “self-deport.”
Last week, the Trump administration announced plans to close down the independent watchdog tasked with reviewing civil rights complaints and other allegations of misconduct. Homeland Security blamed funding lapses after the government shutdown for shuttering the Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman.
One day after a federal officer fatally shot Renee Good in Minnesota, then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem issued a new policy requiring members of Congress to give one week’s notice before visiting ICE facilities, claiming that Trump’s massive spending bill manages congressional visits.
A federal judge twice ruled against the administration, arguing that federal spending laws allow unrestricted congressional visits to ICE detention facilities without advanced notice, a key part of congressional oversight responsibilities.
Last week, a federal appeals court unanimously ruled that those impromptu visits do not cause significant problems for the government. Trump-appointed appeals court Judge Neomi Rao wrote in a 10-page concurring opinion that those congressional visits don’t cause any more than an “administrative inconvenience” for the government.
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