A U.S. Senate investigation has uncovered dozens of credible reports of medical neglect and poor conditions in immigration detention centers across the country — detainees are denied insulin, left without medical care for days and forced to compete for clean water — raising scrutiny over how the government oversees its vast detention system.
The report released by Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., is the second in a series of investigations examining alleged human rights abuses in the immigration detention system. It builds on an August review that detailed mistreatment of children and pregnant women and is based on more than 500 reports of abuse and neglect collected between January and August.
The latest findings document more than 80 credible cases of medical negligence and widespread complaints of lack of water and food. Senate investigators say this points to systemic failures in federal oversight of detentions.
The report cites accounts from detainees, attorneys, advocates, news reports and at least one Department of Homeland Security employee, describing delays in medical care that, in some cases, were life-threatening. One detainee reportedly suffered a heart attack after complaining of chest pain for days without treatment. Others said inhalers and asthma medications were withheld, or that detainees waited weeks for prescriptions to be filled.
A Homeland Security staff member assigned to a detention site told investigators that “ambulances have to come almost every day,” according to the report.
Ossoff said the findings reflect a deeper failure in oversight within federal immigration detention.
“Americans overwhelmingly demand and deserve secure borders. Americans also overwhelmingly oppose detainee abuse and neglect,” Ossoff told The Associated Press. “Every human being has the right to dignity and humane treatment. That is why I have investigated and exposed abuses in prisons, jails and detention centers for years, and that is why this work will continue.”
Medical reports also detail how one diabetic detainee went without glucose or insulin control for two days and became delirious before receiving medical attention and that it took months for another detainee to receive medication to treat gastrointestinal problems.
Expired milk, contaminated water and food shortages are reported.
The Senate investigation also identified persistent complaints about food and water, including evidence drawn from court records, depositions and interviews. Detainees described meals that were too small for adults, milk that was sometimes expired, and water that smelled bad or seemed to make children sick. At a Texas facility, a teenager said adults were forced to compete with children for bottles of clean water when staff left out only a few at a time.
The Associated Press asked U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for comment on the report’s findings several times Wednesday and Thursday, but the agency did not provide a response. The Department of Homeland Security previously criticized Ossoff’s first report in August, saying allegations of abuses against detainees were false and accusing him of trying to “score political points.”
Lawyers for some of those detained in facilities across the country said they have seen firsthand some of the problems related to medical care and food.
Stephanie Alvarez-Jones, Southeast regional attorney for the National Immigration Project, said one of the organization’s clients was denied a prescription medical device while detained at the Angola Camp J facility in Louisiana over the past two months. The man, in his 60s, experienced stroke-like symptoms, including partial paralysis, and was eventually taken to hospital, where he was moved to an intensive care unit for several days.
Doctors prescribed him a walker to help him move around during his recovery, but Alvarez-Jones said detention staff did not allow him to have it when he first returned and placed him in a segregation cell.
“He still couldn’t walk on his own,” she said. “He still had paralysis on his left side.” He added: “He couldn’t get up and get his food, shower alone or go to the bathroom without help. So he had to lie down on dirty sheets because he couldn’t get up.”
Alvarez-Jones said the guards had hinted to the man that they believed he was faking his illness. In the end he was given the option of remaining in the segregation cell and being allowed a walker, or returning to the general detainee population. She said he has been relying on help from others in the general population to eat and use the bathroom while he recovers.
Baltimore field office under review
Amelia Dagen, senior attorney at the Amica Center for Immigrant Rights, is working on a lawsuit against the Baltimore Field Office of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Deportation Operations, as well as officials in charge of national immigration enforcement efforts.
Dagen said several of the organization’s clients have had to fight for access to medication at the Baltimore detention center. Through the lawsuit, he said the government agency had to admit in the court filing that it does not have a food vendor providing three meals a day or medical staff at the facility that was initially only supposed to hold detainees for about 12 hours.
But since January and the various immigration enforcement actions, detainees are much more likely to be held for up to a week in the Baltimore waiting room.
“What we started hearing very quickly, maybe in February, was that the food they were given three times a day was incredibly inadequate,” Dagen said. “We heard that sometimes it would be a protein bar or just bread and water. There’s very little nutritional value and very little variety. I mean, sometimes it was a component of the military ration, but just rice and beans, not a full meal.”
Dagen said detainees also have to ask for bottles of water and are not always given them. The ICE office has taken the position that the sinks attached to the cell bathrooms are a continuous supply of water. But Dagen said detainees complained that the sink water tastes bad.
“This is 100% a problem of their own making,” he said of the authorities. “These detention rooms were not being used in this way before 2025. They are setting these quotas themselves, removing the discretion to release people, and trying to arrest numbers of people that are simply not practical… fully knowing that they do not have the ability to hold these people.”