Caribbean immigration advocates are demanding that the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency immediately close its detention center on the 10th floor of 26 Federal Plaza in Lower Manhattan.

The urgent call came after Senior Judge Lewis Kaplan of the US District Court for the Southern District of New York issued a Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) on Tuesday, Aug. 12, requiring that ICE meet baseline conditions for holding people on the 10th floor of 26 Federal Plaza, including proper spacing, bedding, food, water, hygiene, clean clothes, medication, access to a doctor, and legal phone calls.

“No New Yorker should fear being abducted because they went to immigration court to follow our country’s legal immigration process,” Murad Awawdeh, president and CEO of the New York Immigration Coalition (NYIC), a leading umbrella Caribbean immigration advocacy group, told Caribbean Life.

“Similarly, no person should be subject to the inhumane conditions of the 10th floor of 26 Federal Plaza if they are abducted and detained,” he added. “ICE has repeatedly lied and skirted accountability about what is happening on the 10th floor, as people are being detained for days or weeks at a time without basic care.

“Today’s decision by Judge Lewis Kaplan is a step forward towards justice for the people – and their families – who have been detained there,” Awawdeh continued. “But for many, who have been shipped to far-away detention facilities and even deported, this action has come far too late.

“ICE must immediately end courthouse enforcement operations in New York City, grant members of Congress access to all detention facilities as required by law, and the shadow 10th-floor detention center must be shut down permanently,” he demanded.

Notably, Judge Kaplan’s order prohibits ICE from detaining Caribbean and other immigrants in spaces with less than 50 square feet per person.

It also demands that detained Caribbean and other immigrants be able to make “free, unmonitored, and confidential calls to their lawyers within 24 hours of being detained.”

The order comes just days after the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU), Make the Road New York (MRNY), and Wang Hecker LLP filed a class action lawsuit over the abusive conditions at 26 Federal Plaza.

The order will remain in place for at least 14 days while the judge considers longer-term relief. 

“Today’s order sends a clear message: ICE cannot hold people in abusive conditions and deny them their Constitutional rights to due process and legal representation,” said Eunice Cho, senior staff attorney at the ACLU’s National Prison Project.

“We’ll continue to fight to ensure that people’s rights are upheld at 26 Federal Plaza and beyond,” she added.

Harold Solis, MRNY’s co-legal director, welcomed Judge Kaplan’s decision to place “clear limits on the disturbing and unlawful conditions to which immigrants have been subjected at 26 Federal Plaza.

“This ruling sends a hopeful message, one that reinforces what everyone knows to be true: ICE cannot confine people in inhumane conditions, nor can it obstruct their access to counsel,” he said. “We will remain vigilant to ensure ICE complies with the court’s order.”

Heather Gregorio of Wang Hecker LLP said, “The conditions and lack of attorney access at 26 Federal Plaza have been horrifying and unconscionable.

“Judge Kaplan’s Temporary Restraining Order imposes basic accountability on ICE and requires that it meet constitutional standards, as all human beings deserve,” she added.

Bobby Hodgson, NYCLU’s assistant legal director, said that the US Constitution requires that “no one — especially someone unlawfully arrested at their immigration hearing, which happened to so many people in this case — should have to endure the dehumanizing conditions we’ve challenged in 26 Federal Plaza.

“We look forward to continuing this fight and stopping ICE’s unconstitutional detention practices at 26 Federal Plaza for good,” he said.

Last Wednesday, Awawdeh, along with United States Congressional Representatives in New York Adriano Espaillat, Nydia Velázquez and Dan Goldman), was “confined” by officers from ICE and the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) while conducting an “oversight visit” to the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) in Brooklyn, New York, where over 100 Caribbean and other immigrants are now being detained under a new ICE-BOP agreement.

“When they arrived at the facility, they were intentionally locked in – confined to an area and not permitted to leave,” NYIC said. “After more than 30 minutes, it became clear that because they arrived at the prison to inspect the facility, the prison went on lockdown.

“This blocked not only their access, but also prevented legal counsel inside and outside the facility from reaching detained individuals,” it added. “A prison official eventually came out and officially denied them entry.”

Awawdeh later told Caribbean Life that MDC is “notorious for dangerous and inhumane conditions that have resulted in multiple inmate deaths – including medical neglect, abuse, severe understaffing, and extreme temperatures.

“Detaining any New Yorkers in these conditions violates their human rights,” he said. “And denying Members of Congress access to a federal detention facility is not only morally reprehensible, it is illegal.

“Not only did MDC deny oversight access to their detention center, they went as far as to detain Congressmembers and me,” Awawdeh added. “MDC must be held accountable for this egregious action.

“We join our Congressional representatives to demand the end of illegal detentions, abductions of immigrant New Yorkers at courthouses and on the streets,” he continued. “The Trump administration must end its mass deportation agenda and attacks on immigrants now.”

NYIC has repeatedly called for an end to all arrests of Caribbean and other immigrants at US immigration courts by ICE officers.  

NYIC echoed the call after a South Korean student at Purdue University, Yeonsoo Go, was released from ICE custody five days after she was detained at 26 Federal Plaza in Lower Manhattan at a routine court hearing.

Go was abruptly detained at her visa hearing by ICE agents, NYIC said.

Despite following the proper legal process, NYIC said Go was sent to a US federal detention facility in Louisiana after being detained on the 10th floor of 26 Federal Plaza.

“All families belong together. We are pleased to know that Yeonsoo is now home, reunited with her family and community where she belongs,” Awawdeh told Caribbean Life. Yeonsoo’s release comes after a traumatic and unjust detention that should never have happened.