SouthernWorldwide.com – A New York City lawmaker, who identifies as the first congressman to have previously been undocumented, exhibited a defiant stance this week upon arriving at the Delaney Hall detention center in Newark, presenting a court order and demanding entry.
Representative Adriano Espaillat, a Democrat from Washington Heights, was among three Manhattan lawmakers who converged on the facility on Wednesday. Their objective was to call for the Trump administration to shut down the center and, in the interim, ensure more humane treatment for those detained inside.
“Shut it down,” Espaillat declared forcefully, after spending some time inside Delaney Hall, reportedly to visit detainees.
Upon his arrival, Espaillat and his aides approached the entrance gate. The congressman then produced a document, waving it and identifying himself to the guards. He stated that a judge had granted him clearance to enter.
“I have a court order here that allows me to come in. I will go in because the Constitution protects me,” Espaillat loudly informed the individuals at the gate.
Espaillat also revealed that he is one of twelve plaintiffs in a lawsuit aiming to compel the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to permit lawmakers to access any detention center, including privately operated facilities like Delaney Hall, at any time and without prior notice.
The court order Espaillat displayed appeared to bear the letterhead of a federal court in the District of Columbia. It indicated that the case had been heard by two Obama appointees, Cornelia Pillard and Robert Wilkins, and one Trump appointee, Neomi Rao, who succeeded Justice Brett Kavanaugh on the appellate bench. Representative Joe Neguse of Colorado was listed as the lead plaintiff.
“I’m going to be introducing legislation that would allow Governor Mikie Sherrill and any governor or any state to be able to come and inspect a federal detention center like this. So I plan to do that very soon,” Espaillat stated.
He asserted that any public official should be granted access to Delaney Hall to inspect its conditions. Espaillat claimed that the majority of individuals held there are “working people,” before briefly switching to Spanish.
“They are not criminals they… have been ripped from their families and thrown in here,” he said.
Shortly after his departure, Representatives Jerrold Nadler and Daniel Goldman arrived together and spent nearly two hours inside the facility.
Nadler began to voice his opposition to the conditions at the center even before reaching the microphone. He alleged that the “food is very sparse” and that inmates only eat at 4 a.m., noon, and 4 p.m.
“And very often, they eat maggots in the food,” he claimed, an assertion that was denied by opposing parties.
He also stated that medical services were limited and that inmates experienced long waits for treatment, a claim that protesters later echoed when shouting at ICE agents.
However, ambulances from a local Newark hospital were observed arriving regularly throughout Wednesday and Thursday, seemingly contradicting the claims that detainees were not receiving medical care.
“We know that they’re not getting any kind of justice because we know that the president is — these cases go before immigration judges. And we know the president is firing all immigration judges who grant asylum,” Nadler alleged.
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He then yielded to Goldman, who spoke along similar lines. However, unlike Nadler, Goldman was repeatedly interrupted by some individuals in the crowd.
A protester could be heard making a comment related to the Israel-Gaza conflict, noting that both Goldman and Nadler are Jewish. Another man, whom a protester verbally identified as a “Proud Boy,” began heckling Goldman about federal statutes governing the enforcement of immigration law.
“I want to thank the advocates who are here every day fighting for the freedom of those who are unjustly and illegally being held in there. My colleague, Mr. Nadler, spoke a bit about the conditions. And they, I think, are easiest to be summed up as: this is criminal jail and none of these people are criminals,” Goldman stated.
He shared an encounter with a man who had resided in the U.S. for 23 years and has American-citizen children. This individual, however, was detained by DHS after appearing for a “green card interview.”
“I don’t care what your view is on immigration policy or how you think that the policy should be. The bottom line is if you are human, if you’re American, you cannot support what is going on here,” he urged.
Goldman, an attorney who notably represented then-Rep. Adam Schiff during the Trump impeachment investigation, stated that the inmates have “almost no [legal] representation.”
He mentioned that he repeatedly asked inmates if they had criminal records and consistently received negative responses.
In turn, he used this recollection to criticize the White House and a prominent Trump confidant who has been instrumental in advising on immigration policy.
“When Donald Trump and Stephen Miller say that this ICE deportation dragnet is going after the worst of the worst, they are lying,” he asserted.
Goldman accused Trump and Miller of deliberately creating dire conditions, such as those alleged within Delaney Hall, to pressure inmates into opting for “voluntary departure” and self-deportation.
As Goldman continued speaking, a man standing beside him began to interject, asking him to condemn protester violence.
Goldman appeared unfazed but occasionally turned to address the man before being confronted by another member of the congressmen’s security detail.
The visit by the Manhattan lawmakers was less tumultuous, however, than an encounter the previous day involving another public official. Senator Andy Kim of New Jersey was reportedly pepper-sprayed by ICE after allegedly intervening between two factions on the street in an apparent attempt to de-escalate tensions.
The situation did not calm down after the congressmen departed, as pepper spray was again deployed on Wednesday and Thursday evenings. The at-times-heated demonstrations showed no signs of subsiding.
