Liberty and Justice for All

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Ms. CHU. Under Donald Trump's watch, 56 people have died in ICE custody since January, roughly one person every 11 days. Countless more individuals have suffered inside U.S. detention, denied medical care, served rotten food and dirty water, and held in filthy conditions that breed illness.

For the past 10 years, I have witnessed conditions firsthand at Adelanto ICE Processing Center, one of the deadliest immigration detention facilities in the country. During Trump's second term alone, five people have died, four while in custody and one shortly after being released: Gabriel Garcia-Aviles, Ismael Ayala-Uribe, Alberto Gutierrez-Reyes, Irvin Cruz Nape, and Jose Ramos-Solano. These were fathers, grandfathers, and community members whose lives were needlessly and painfully cut short.

In June, I met directly with Adelanto detainees on a hunger strike. They told me how they use their own underwear to filter worms out of their drinking water, how the food they have been given is rotten or raw, and how they have watched fellow detainees suffer and ultimately die from medical emergencies when all ICE offered them was ibuprofen.

These conditions are so severe that, in July, a Federal judge ruled that ICE must immediately overhaul the living conditions in Adelanto.

This is not an accident. It is a result of a system that Republicans in Congress continue to fund without demanding a single reform. They have handed ICE billions of dollars with no accountability for the deaths, abuse, or suffering happening on their watch.

Americans don't want this. They want ICE out of their communities. They want Congress to hold this agency accountable for the lives lost and the lives still at risk inside facilities like Adelanto.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source