Dozens of women appear to have been transferred by Immigration and Customs Enforcement to a tent-like facility in El Paso following a disturbance and escape Thursday from a crowded New Jersey detention center.
Media reported that migrants were seen being loaded into large white vans Friday night at the Newark facility known as Delaney Hall following a melee the day before that included an escape by four men detained at the 1,000-bed ICE detention facility operated by the private company GEO Group.
ICE wouldn’t disclose to the media whether any detainees had been moved from the Newark facility, or where they may have gone. But a woman told her family over the weekend that she had been moved from Newark to a facility that matches the description of what the government calls a “soft-sided facility” that ICE has been operating since earlier this year at the Northeast edge of El Paso off U.S. Highway 54.
The woman told her family that about 50 women housed with her in New Jersey were moved to El Paso, but she couldn’t say if others also were moved, her sister said in a phone interview with El Paso Matters.
“She specifically used the word animals — they were being treated like animals inhumanely the way they were transferred over to Texas. She said that they weren’t given any beds. They were in tents outside, just waiting for directions. She mentioned that they were being emotionally abused, and she just broke down when she said that,” the sister said.
El Paso Matters is not naming the detainee or her family, who are concerned about potential retaliation by the U.S. government.
ICE officials in El Paso and Washington, D.C., did not respond to requests for comment by El Paso Matters.
The Newark facility, like many ICE detention centers, has been at or over capacity in recent weeks as the Trump administration has stepped up efforts to fulfill a campaign promise of mass deportations. Many of the detainees at the Newark facility had complained of living conditions, including poor food quality, ahead of an uprising Thursday that included the escape of four men being held there.
Sen. Andy Kim, D-New Jersey, told media after touring the facility that the men had punched a hole in a wall and walked away. Only one of the escapees had been reported captured as of Sunday.
The sister of the detainee who talked with El Paso Matters said families of detainees were given little information on the status of their loved ones after the disturbance. She said family members had talked to the woman Thursday night, and could hear noises in the background.
“We did hear all of the banging that was going on in the background, and we would ask her, ‘What are those sounds?’ She said, ‘The men’s side, they keep wanting to escape. The alarms keep going off, but we’re just trying to keep it cool here on the women’s side of the facility,’” the sister said.
The family talked with her again at about noon Friday, when she told them the women were hearing rumors they would be transferred.
“But we said, ‘Hey, we haven’t heard anything. We’re talking to the lawyers. They haven’t heard anything. The media didn’t hear of anything yet.’”
She was scheduled to talk with her family at 9 p.m. Friday, but didn’t make the call. They called Delaney Hall to ask what was happening.
“A man answered, and he said, ‘No, we’re not transferring anyone.’ That’s all he said. Then, we got a phone call from my sister Saturday morning, my mom did, and she confirmed that she was indeed transferred.”
The detained woman is a native of Ecuador who has lived in the United States more than 20 years and has authorization to work in the country, according to documents provided to El Paso Matters by her sister. She has three children who are U.S. citizens and applied for permanent residency this year after marrying a U.S. citizen in 2024, her sister said.
The ICE inmate locator shows that the woman is being held at an unnamed facility in Texas.
The locator lists the facility as being in the 79934 ZIP code, which matches the location of the soft-sided complex that was opened in January 2023 to serve as a processing center for migrants taken into custody by Border Patrol agents.
It was designed to house up to 1,000 people for short stays when opened by the Biden administration when unauthorized border crossings were at their highest levels in more than 50 years. The number of crossings dropped rapidly in the last year of the Biden administration and have continued to decline since President Donald Trump took office in January.
The facility has been used by the Trump administration as an ICE detention facility, although it wasn’t designed to hold people for extended periods of time.
The New Jersey woman told her family Saturday that officials at the El Paso facility told the newly arrived detainees that they wouldn’t be there long.
“She said that the officers kept saying that they’re the next group to be deported, and they have 72 hours to leave, 72 hours before they would take them,” the sister said.
In a call Sunday, the Ecuadorian woman seemed more at ease.
“We have been lucky that they’re treating us well. We eat good food, we shower every day, they give us clean clothes every day,” she said in Spanish on a recording of the call provided to El Paso Matters by her family.
She said a woman officer, who she called “a very good person,” told the detainees they didn’t face imminent deportation as they had been told by another officer to whom she referred to as the “security.”
“I swear that gave us a lot of hope, that what the security said should not worry us,” the woman said on the call. “The security here lied to us, they told us that we were all going to be deported, but those are all lies.”
In addition to having a husband and three children who are U.S. citizens, the woman’s mother and three siblings are all naturalized citizens, her sister said. The detained woman is the oldest of the siblings and had not sought naturalization until the past year.
The dreams of possible citizenship came crashing down earlier this month when the woman was arrested for allegedly violating a restraining order taken out by her ex-boyfriend, the father of their three children. The sister said the ex-boyfriend was emotionally abusive during the relationship and both partners had sought restraining orders after separating.
Court records show the charge was later dismissed, but the ex-boyfriend apparently notified ICE of the arrest, and she was taken into immigration custody before she could be released from jail, her sister said.
She is scheduled to appear before an immigration judge for initial proceedings June 18, and her family will seek to have her released on bail, her sister said. The woman told her family that the “nice” official told the detainees to have patience with the process.
“I say, I don’t care. I tell myself I don’t care as long as they get me out of here because here is where they deport everyone,” she told her family on the Sunday call.
Her incarceration has caused strains for her family, the sister said.
“My mom is honestly the most heartbroken here because she always got a phone call from my sister every day, asking how her day’s going,” the sister said.
The oldest of four siblings, the detained woman is trying to keep her family’s spirits up, her sister said.
“And even just talking to her today and just seeing how strong of a voice she was trying to put on, even though she really wanted to break down being alone, scared, in a state she’s never actually visited before, she’s very strong. That’s really the biggest thing about her.”
The post Women from turbulent New Jersey ICE detention facility moved to El Paso appeared first on El Paso Matters.
Read: Read More