ICE imposes new restrictions on members of Congress inspecting detention facilities

WASHINGTON – The new Immigration and Customs Enforcement policy requires members of Congress to seek advanced authorization to speak with inmates during probation checks in detention facilities.

It’s the latest twist in ICE’s months-long effort to limit such visits by lawmakers, which have ramped up during the Trump administration’s deportation campaign.

California Reps. Mike Levin (D-San Juan Capistrano) and Sara Jacobs (D-San Diego) learned about the new policy during a surprise visit Monday to the Otay Mesa Detention Center in San Diego.

ICE let them in, Levin said, but when members asked to speak with the detainees, local staff handed them a memo explaining the new policy — dated the same day and signed by ICE Acting Director Todd Lyons.

In it, Lyons calls the visit disruptive and resource-consuming because it takes staff away from law enforcement. Lawmakers sometimes ask to speak with a certain type of inmate — for example, people held for more than 90 days — and Lyons said meeting such requests takes a lot of time.

“This is an intolerable burden on ICE staff and a hindrance to ICE’s operations given the exceptional growth in congressional visits,” he wrote.

To proceed, members must identify inmates by name at least two business days prior to the visit and provide a signed consent form from each inmate.

The Department of Homeland Security and ICE did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Levin said the new policy defeats the purpose of unannounced oversight visits.

“I think it’s a deliberate effort to make sure that we help people who are in ICE custody,” she said.

House Democrats sued the Trump administration last July after they were repeatedly denied access to immigration detention centers in California and across the country.

Under federal law, funds appropriated by Congress cannot be used to prevent a member of Congress from entering or inspecting a detention facility operated by Homeland Security.

Monday’s unannounced visit was Levin’s first to the Otay Mesa facility since a federal judge in February blocked an earlier Trump administration policy requiring members of Congress to give seven days’ notice before visiting ICE detention facilities.

The administration appealed, and on Friday an appeals court in Washington rejected the administration’s request to reinstate the seven-day policy while the case was pending, saying the government had not provided enough evidence that the visit was dangerous.

That victory for lawmakers may be short-lived — a panel of judges rejected the administration’s request and wrote in its order that members of Congress “do not have standing to maintain this case, so the government is likely to succeed on the merits of its appeal.”

In the new ICE policy memo, Lyons noted that in the 10 fiscal years before 2025, ICE has facilitated about 45 congressional visits to detention facilities each year.

After Trump took office, the agency approved more than 150 visits by fiscal year 2025. As of May 11, ICE has facilitated nearly 200 congressional visits since the beginning of this fiscal year.

Levin said the increased visits by him and other members have become necessary because Homeland Security has cut most of the staff at the Office of Human Rights and Civil Liberties, and the Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman.

“The volume that Lyons is talking about is a direct result of his department breaking out all other options,” Levin said. “They opposed internal oversight and complained that external oversight was too effective, then issued a memo to limit it. All of that only makes sense if the goal is not oversight.”

In previous visits, Levin said he would request inmates who meet certain criteria, such as those held in a unit of the facility that is the source of complaints to his office. Those who were arrested wrote their names on a piece of paper if they wanted to talk to him.

Denied to speak with inmates, Levin explored what he could do at Otay Mesa on Monday. Levin said he drank the facility’s water (which sounded like regular tap water) and tried the food — chili, salad, corn, chips and a cake that “won’t win culinary awards, but it’s okay.”

At one point, Levin said he saw an inmate using a tablet and asked how it worked. An employee stepped in and reminded him of the new policy, he said.

Observation is a necessary part of any experiment, Levin says, but you don’t really know what’s going on without talking to people in a random way.

The facility holds 1,008 ICE detainees — 864 men and 144 women, as well as others held by the US Marshals Service, Levin said. About one-third of those arrested were from Mexico, with smaller numbers from Guatemala, China and other countries. On average, they were detained for 130 days.

Levin said he sent the ICE memo to Rep. Joe Neguse (D-Colo.), who is the lead plaintiff in the oversight visit case, and attorneys in the case are now reviewing its legality.

So far this year 18 people have died in immigration detention facilities, leaving 2026 on track to be the agency’s worst year in more than two decades. Last year, 32 people died in detention centers.

Since Trump returned to the White House, reports from detention centers have revealed issues of overcrowding, lack of health care and widespread use of force.