[Congressional Record Volume 172, Number 57 (Thursday, March 26, 2026)]
[House]
[Pages H2755-H2761]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
END CRUEL IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT AGAINST KIDS
(Under the Speaker's announced policy of January 3, 2025, Ms. Dexter
of Oregon was recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority
leader.)
General Leave
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may
have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and
submit extraneous material into the Record.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Van Epps). Is there objection to the
request of the gentlewoman from Oregon?
There was no objection.
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I want to tell you about a second grader
named Diana Crespo-Gonzalez. She loves to draw, and she loves school.
On January 16, she was sick. She had a persistent fever, her nose
wouldn't stop bleeding, and her parents did what any good parents would
do. They took their child to see a doctor. They never made it inside.
Instead, immigration agents surrounded their car. The parents pleaded
with the agents to just let their daughter get seen.
Think about that for a second, Mr. Speaker. Put yourself in their
car, wondering if you made a mistake by taking your child to a doctor.
Shortly after, Diana and her parents were detained and transported
2,000 miles from their home in Gresham, Oregon, to the Dilley child
family detention facility in Texas, the largest child detention
facility in the United States.
I will say that again: the largest child detention facility in the
United States. That is a sentence that should not exist.
The conditions at Dilley are not just bad; they are indefensible and
inhumane. The food is inedible. One father detained there with his
child said: ``We were given wormy food, and when someone spoke out
about it and said that the children should get better food, he was
taken in the middle of the night and threatened that he and his family
would be separated.''
Another said: ``Sometimes there are strange things in the food, and
it seems like strange parts of an animal that shouldn't be in the food,
but many children do not eat the food here. It worries me when there
are so many small children who are just not eating.''
A 14-year-old said that his 7-year-old brother stopped eating
entirely. Many report that the water is not drinkable, that it is too
salty, and that it smells of chemicals. If you do drink it, your
stomach turns with pain.
It is not just food and water, but the foundation of human life. As
if that weren't bad enough, these kids and families are also being
deprived of sleep, healthcare, and education. Children inside have
reported ideas of self-harm, even suicide.
A 14-year-old who was detained for 45 days said: ``Since I got to
this center, all you will feel is sadness and mostly depression.''
Mr. Speaker, if you advocate for yourself, or as a parent advocating
for your child, there is the threat of retaliation.
One father said: ``We are scared to ask for anything because the
officers start threatening us that they will put us in different
detention centers and put our children in foster care.''
This is where they sent Diana, a second grader who just needed to see
a doctor.
I couldn't stand back while she was in prison there, and I had a
chance to help. One of the most important lessons I have learned in my
first year in Congress, Mr. Speaker, is that you cannot defend your
constituents from behind a desk. Showing up and advocating for the
people you represent matters.
So I traveled to Texas with plane tickets in hand to bring Diana and
her parents back to Oregon. When I arrived, officials repeatedly
blocked my entry, giving shifting and contradictory explanations as to
why.
I was told I could not enter because of measles cases, despite an
officer telling me just the day before that there were no active cases
and no risk.
I was told to leave. I was told to wait. I was told nothing at all.
The message was clear: Don't look too closely.
Oversight isn't optional. When ICE blocked me from entering, I made
it clear that if they would not let me in, they would at least bring my
constituents out to speak with me. After hours of waiting and arguing,
ICE actually did more than that. They released the Crespo-Gonzalez
family altogether. I was able to escort them home.
Diana made it home, but there are children today who are still
trapped in Dilley. Legally, children are not supposed to be in custody
for more than 20 days, yet dozens of children have been
[[Page H2756]]
detained at Dilley for over 3 months, one-third of a school year spent
in prison--children who are sick, children who are scared, and children
who do not understand why this is happening to them.
It is not just children who have been detained who feel the trauma of
this immigration crackdown. Children in my district live in fear of the
ICE man. He comes to them in their dreams, and it worries them that
they are going to come to get them or a loved one. I heard it from a
teacher in Oregon who shared how devastating ICE's presence has been
for her students.
She said: ``Many students stopped coming to school for weeks, either
because parents did not feel safe to bring them to school or students
did not feel safe to leave their parents, knowing they might come home
to an empty house.''
Across this country, ICE is targeting children outside of schools,
outside of clinics, and outside of their own homes. Immigration
enforcement against children is inhumane and unnecessary. Families can
and should be able to navigate their immigration cases together and in
community, with the support of loved ones and legal services.
This is about who we are and who we want to be as a country. Kids
need care and compassion, not cruelty and cages.
Today, we will spotlight the importance of ending cruel immigration
enforcement against children once and for all.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Tonko), who
is my co-host for this important event.
{time} 1600
Mr. TONKO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. I thank
Congresswoman Dexter for being such a strong and bold voice for justice
and fairness in this House. She is such a great, welcome addition to
the Caucus and to the House, and we appreciate her work.
We are convening this effort because of the urgent discussion that is
necessary to bring very strong, laser-sharp focus to this issue.
The Trump administration has repeatedly shown that it is willing to
use any method in its brutal and inhumane immigration agenda. That
includes detaining kids like 5-year-old Liam Ramos on his way home from
school in January in Minnesota or ending longstanding guidance that
banned immigration enforcement activities at sensitive locations like
our hospitals, courthouses, or schools. It includes putting a former
ICE official in charge of the Department of Health and Human Services
Office of Refugee Resettlement, or ORR, the agency responsible for
unaccompanied children.
It is no surprise, then, that this administration is treating
unaccompanied children like criminals. Often, these children arriving
in the United States without a parent or guardian are fleeing
persecution, violence, and trafficking.
Congress expressly authorized the ORR to care for unaccompanied
children with a separate charge from immigration enforcement. However,
tragically, over the past year, the ORR and ICE have become one and the
same, and it is traumatizing our children.
Unaccompanied children are now being held by ORR for an average of
over 200 days. Let me repeat that. Kids who are alone who have fled all
that they have ever known are being held by our government for over
half a year of their life. They thought they were coming to America for
a better life.
In many instances, these facilities are failing to provide basic care
to these children. Yet, they continue to hold these kids even when they
have a family member who is ready to care for them outside of ORR
custody.
Take Diego. His father was approved to care for him after he arrived
unaccompanied in 2024, but he was re-detained in November of 2025 and
held for 4 months because of a new DNA requirement by ORR.
To make matters worse, ORR is now sharing data and information on
potential sponsors with ICE, so many parents and family members who
want to care for these children are frightened to provide any
information that could lead to their arrest or their detention. On
several occasions, ICE has used these kids as a lure, a lure to detain
family members.
Carlos, a father with temporary protected status, was detained during
a December 2025 appointment with ICE in New Mexico that he thought was
a regular step in his effort to reunify with his 14- and 16-year-old
children who had been held in ORR custody for almost a year.
While Carlos was released on a judge's order, his children are still
in ORR custody. His son is now 15 and regularly has panic attacks. His
daughter is afraid that she will wait for her father forever. That is
despicable. These draconian tactics are creating lasting trauma for
these kids and their families, and we are already seeing the effects.
No child should have to worry about whether they will be used as bait
by the government. No child should sit in detention for months on end.
No child should face additional trauma here in our United States.
This issue is deeply personal for me. As a once-New York State
legislator, one of my proudest accomplishments was passing Timothy's
Law, which enacted mental health care parity across the State of New
York. The law was named after a young constituent of mine, Timothy
O'Clair, who, after suffering with mental illness and not receiving the
care that he needed, took his own life at 12 years of age.
We must take the mental health of children seriously. They are not
pawns. They are not bait. They are not criminals. They are children who
deserve care. Stop traumatizing children. Stop the cruel immigration
enforcement against our kids.
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Vermont (Ms.
Balint).
Ms. BALINT. Mr. Speaker, I thank both my colleagues for holding this
Special Order. It is such an important issue that so many of our
constituents care about. I know that, representing my home State of
Vermont, people are just absolutely outraged by what is happening.
I am a former teacher. I am also a mom of two teenagers, and I know
deep in my bones that we have to care for all our children. When I see
ICE targeting children and using kids as bait to get to their parents,
I feel sick. I am disgusted.
What has happened to our humanity, our moral compass in this country?
From the start of Trump's term until last October, at least 3,800
kids were booked into ICE custody. This includes roughly 500 children
under the age of 5 and at least 20 infants.
Do you remember the experience of Liam Ramos? He was 5 years old when
he was picked up. He was 5. I remember what my kids were doing when
they were 5. My son and daughter were learning how to spell their
names. They were learning how to count to 10. They were drawing and
singing and riding their bikes. They were running around with wild
abandon on a playground.
This is what we are talking about when we talk about 5-year-old kids.
Our government is locking them up with our taxpayer money. This is who
President Trump and Stephen Miller want us to believe are villains in
our national story. They are kids. They are kids.
As my colleague said: What is happening in these facilities? They
don't have clean water. They don't have food that they can eat that
isn't filled with worms. Think about that. There is nothing that
justifies treating children like this. Nothing.
They are our kids, and I am using that because it is the truth of the
matter. It is not somebody else's kids. These are our kids. They live
in our communities. They live in our districts, and we should care
about all of our kids. Every single child in this country deserves care
and humane treatment. It is that simple.
What is happening at the hands of ICE is an abomination. Kids are not
the enemy. I can't believe I even have to say that on the floor of the
House of Representatives of the United States of America, that kids are
not the enemy. This is a fundamental question of decency and who we
claim to be as Americans.
Are we a country that looks at a child and sees innocence and wonder
and potential or are we looking at a child and seeing some kind of
enemy, an enemy of the people?
This is absurd. This is unconscionable. Again, it is happening with
our
[[Page H2757]]
taxpayer money. You cannot look away. I know what Vermonters believe,
which is why I took to the floor today. Children deserve protection and
dignity, period. No exceptions. We must fight together to find our way,
our collective way, back to decency and compassion in this country.
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr.
Garcia).
Mr. GARCIA of Illinois. Mr. Speaker, I thank Representatives Dexter
and Tonko for shining a spotlight on the impact on children from the
enforcement efforts of ICE and Customs and Border Protection agents.
Here is what is happening in communities across the country: A 1-
year-old baby and his parents are pepper-sprayed while driving to the
grocery store.
A high school student was zip-tied and detained on his way to school
despite his U.S. citizenship, and he was detained for several days.
Families with children were ripped out of bed in the dead of night,
zip-tied, and detained after the apartments that they lived in were
raided by agents using military helicopters, so Kristi Noem could get
her videos.
Children at a daycare were startled, scared, and traumatized by the
armed agents bursting into their classrooms, chasing one of their
teachers to abduct her.
{time} 1610
These scenes are not from a war zone. These are violent incidents
that happened in Cicero, in Roscoe Village, in South Shore, and in my
own neighborhood of Little Village in Chicagoland.
Those were ICE and CBP agents, paid by our tax dollars, committing
atrocities, targeting my constituents and their children because of the
color of their skin or the places where their parents worked.
More than 500 children were being held at the immigration detention
center in Dilley, Texas, in January alone. Many for more than twice the
20 days that the law allows the government to hold children in
detention.
We have seen the pictures drawn by some of these children. Their
letters longing for their friends, schools, and families, a return to
normalcy. Then the administration took away their crayons and paper so
that people outside the detention center wouldn't learn what was
happening inside.
Right now, two of my constituents are detained at Dilley, a mother
and her 13-year-old son who were taken by ICE at a routine check-in
appointment. Both had developed serious physical and mental issues, but
ICE is denying them medical attention and medication.
They are not the only ones. Children have suffered for months because
of the abuses of ICE and CBP agents. Many of them may never overcome
the trauma caused by their time in detention and the violent actions of
our own government.
The stories I shared are just some of the children we know about.
There are hundreds of children terrorized by ICE who we don't know
about.
Mr. Speaker, I ask my Republican colleagues, what is the purpose of
imprisoning innocent children? No moral or legal argument exists to
justify imprisoning and neglecting children. I implore my Republican
colleagues to care for these children as if they were our own. Anything
less is inexcusable.
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Illinois
(Mrs. Ramirez).
Mrs. RAMIREZ. Mr. Speaker, I rise to share Steven's story. Who is
Steven some may ask?
Steven is a constituent, and he is a 14-year-old boy, an eighth
grader with autism, who spent 66 days incarcerated in Dilley
Immigration Processing Center.
Steven and his dad are finally back home with their family and the
community that loves them. However, this past Monday, I accompanied
Steven and his father, Victor, to their check-in at ICE. I witnessed
firsthand the pain and the trauma caused by the cruelty of separation
and detention. Each day that Steven spent in inhumane and unsanitary
conditions in Dilley took a toll on this little boy.
Steven didn't want to go to his check-in on Monday because the last
time he showed up for the check-in with his father as he had been told,
he was kidnapped for 66 days.
When he got there and he saw me, he was grateful, but I can see the
great distress in the face of this little boy. I saw a child as we went
in for his check-in cower in the corner of a chair in the fetal
position with his ears covered because he was so afraid to hear the
words that he and his father heard the last time he was there. He was
so afraid of going back to detention.
Let me say it and let me say it loud and clear in the people's House.
Shame on every person in this country who thinks it is acceptable to
terrorize children. Shame on you who talk about being the party of
children and family who is locking them up in cages, who is separating
them from their loved ones, from their community, denying them from
air, from Sun, from play, from laughter, from joy, and every single
thing a baby, a child deserves.
President Mandela said: ``There can be no keener revelation of a
society's soul than the way in which it treats its children.''
Incarcerating children is an evil, morally bankrupt practice that
calls into question any commitment our Nation has or claims to care
about their preciousness.
We must unleash our collective outrage. Don't look away and don't
normalize children in cages. We must demand that no other children
experience what Steven has experienced or more than 3,800 children have
experienced in ICE so far.
We will melt ICE, and I have a bill to do just that. We will
dismantle the Department of Homeland Security because, frankly, at this
juncture, nothing less is acceptable.
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Wisconsin
(Ms. Moore).
Ms. MOORE of Wisconsin. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong
opposition to the Trump administration's careless and cruel family
separation policies.
Experts like the Society for Research and Child Development and the
American Academy of Pediatrics agree that immigration detention and
separation is a deeply traumatic, adverse childhood experience causing
post-traumatic stress disorder, and it is never in the best interest of
the child.
Yet, day after day, ICE continues to abduct children from their
families, subjecting them to prisonlike confinement and conditions and
exposing them to lifelong trauma.
Since President Trump took office, the number of children held in ICE
detention each day has increased sixfold. By October 2025, at least
3,800 children had entered ICE custody and more than 1,300 of them were
detained for over 20 days.
Mr. Speaker, these are not just numbers. These are real children,
human beings whose lives have been disrupted and damaged permanently.
DHS facilities often fail to meet the basic standards of care, decent
and adequate food, including medical care and mental health care. We
just cannot stand by and watch while the administration forcibly
separates families, inflicts long-term trauma on our Nation's youth,
and strips our youth of safety and dignity.
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from California
(Mr. Vargas).
Mr. VARGAS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding.
Mr. Speaker, the Trump administration's immigration crackdown has
unleashed a cruelty that really knows no limits.
Trump's ICE agents have beaten, tear-gassed, and murdered innocent
people. They have wrongfully detained and deported U.S. citizens, but
nothing demonstrates the cruelty of this administration more than the
way that they have treated children, children, as we have heard today.
There has been a sixfold increase in the daily number of children in
ICE detention under Trump. these are children like Liam Conejo Ramos,
the little boy in the blue hat who was detained on his walk home from
school and sent to the Dilley Family Detention center, or children like
Susej, a 9-year-old detained at Dilley, who, in a letter released by
ProPublica, wrote: ``I miss my school and my friends. . . . I have been
here too long.'' She is a 9-year-old girl.
My wife and I have two daughters, and the Psalmist tells us in Psalm
127 that children are a blessing. They are not a burden. They are a
blessing. I can tell you for a fact that our children
[[Page H2758]]
have been a blessing. I remember my girls putting on little hats. I
remember how much they loved those little hats. Those memories are
etched in my heart.
{time} 1620
I think every parent, when they saw that little boy with the blue
hat, remembered their child and said: How can we be doing this in our
own country? What an immorality and what an injustice this is. Yet, we
do it, and we do it every day.
These children have been held captive in detention and are missing
their friends. They are falling behind at school and facing deplorable
conditions, as we have heard today. Their health and wellness are
deteriorating.
It is just not detention. Kids across the country are struggling
under the constant threat of ICE. Children are being wrongfully
deported. They deserve better.
We will never forget the nightmare this administration has inflicted
on children across our country. It is going to leave an indelible mark,
an evil mark. We must hold this administration and ICE accountable. We
cannot accept anything less. Remember our own children.
Mr. Speaker, I have to tell you that I have many friends on the other
side, and I cherish their friendship. I pray with them on Thursdays. I
know they love children. I know they love their own children. Yet, to
allow this to happen is immoral, it is a crime, and we have to do
something about this together.
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I now yield to the gentlewoman from
Washington and the ranking member of the Judiciary Subcommittee on
Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement (Ms. Jayapal).
Ms. JAYAPAL. Mr. Speaker, I thank Representatives Dexter and Tonko
for hosting this incredibly important Special Order hour.
Since Donald Trump was sworn in 14 months ago, DHS has terrorized our
children. Every single day 50 U.S. citizen children have had a parent
detained, on average, and over 11,000 American children in total. After
Trump restarted the cruel practice of detaining families and children,
ICE has jailed about 3,500 adults and children. That includes over 900
children jailed beyond the 20-day legal limit set by longstanding legal
settlement.
More and more children are forced to appear in court alone as Trump
has cut funding for legal representation. Let's talk about what this
all looks like.
In Washington State, ICE arrested a mother dropping off her 4-year-
old son at a preschool.
In Oregon, masked ICE agents broke the car windows and arrested a
father dropping off his son at preschool.
In Chicago, ICE dragged a daycare worker out of the facility, slammed
her face against the daycare's glass doors, and arrested her.
Recently, in Vermont, the community surrounded a home for hours as
ICE sought to enter without a warrant. Demonstrators created a human
tunnel allowing a 4-year-old child wrapped in a blanket to escape the
home. Her mother was desperate to get her to safety.
This is horrifying. We can't talk about any of this without
recognizing the toll on our educators and our daycare workers who are
on the front lines doing everything they can to protect our children,
even as many of them are immigrants as well and face threats to their
own safety.
We have also seen Federal agents use physical violence and chemical
weapons indiscriminately.
In Chicago, Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino deployed tear gas
in a residential neighborhood as children were gathering for a
Halloween parade. In the words of a Federal judge: These kids, their
sense of safety was shattered, and it is going to take a long time for
that to come back.
In Minneapolis, ICE deployed tear gas near a family in their car,
causing a 6-month-old baby to stop breathing.
All of this leads to lasting trauma for our children, regardless of
their immigration status or whether they have an immigrant parent or a
family member.
Here is what Allison Bassett Ratto, a child clinical psychologist,
has said about the harms to children: What they see are their
classmates, their family members, and their neighbors often being
apprehended in violent and confusing ways while doing things like
picking up their children from the bus stop or going to their jobs. For
children, this creates a sense that nowhere and no one is safe. The
stress, the anxiety, and the trauma can become chronic, leading to both
immediate and long-term damage to children's mental and physical
health.
Tomorrow, as ranking member of the Immigration Subcommittee, I will
be holding a hearing entitled: Trump's Assault on Our Children, and we
will have legal and medical experts, educators, and directly impacted
people who will testify to the harms and the trauma being caused to our
children.
Donald Trump ran on going after the so-called worst of the worst. It
has been very clear that this was never his intent. He made it clear
that chaos and cruelty go hand in hand with mass deportation. It is
inflicting lasting trauma on our children, regardless of immigration
status.
Do not close your eyes. Do not close your eyes to this harm that our
own government is inflicting on our children. Do not talk about
Christian values or any other religious value and then traumatize our
children.
Mr. Speaker, we will not stop fighting against this horror. We will
not stop because it is our responsibility in this body to make sure
that our government is not traumatizing these kids.
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I now yield to the gentlewoman from Arizona,
Mrs. Grijalva.
Mrs. GRIJALVA. Mr. Speaker, a 9-year-old boy named Deiver, told Ms.
Rachel, a well-known online educator in a recent interview: Can you
help us leave here? I don't want to be here anymore. I want to leave
and go to the spelling bee.
This is so heartbreaking, cruel, and reprehensible. It shows the real
harm caused by immigration policies pushed by Trump. The Republican
Party isn't just watching. It is supporting, defending, and funding it.
Our children, ``our babies,'' ``nuestros ninos,'' are being locked in
detention, separated from their families, and traumatized.
There are too many stories like Deiver's, and each one is a moral
failure of our government and this administration. No family deserves
this. No one deserves this.
Deiver has been released. But what about the hundreds of babies and
children who haven't? Who will be torn from their parents next? Who
will be disappeared next?
These children don't belong locked away in jails. They belong in
classrooms. They belong at school, learning, dreaming, and preparing
for spelling bees, not living in constant fear that they will be taken
away from their family and friends, and disappeared.
How does locking up our babies make this country safer? This is not
politics.
Mr. Speaker, this is a moral crisis, and it is on all of us, on every
single one of us, to act.
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I now yield to the gentlewoman from
California (Ms. Rivas.)
Ms. RIVAS. Mr. Speaker, I thank Congresswoman Dexter and Congressman
Tonko for hosting this conversation that shines a light on ICE's
cruelty.
I have seen firsthand the cruelty of ICE in my district, the San
Fernando Valley in Los Angeles.
Last year, a mother and two children were detained at the Van Nuys
Courthouse after a judge dismissed their asylum case. They were
immediately taken by ICE and sent to the Dilley detention center in
Texas. My casework team worked to release them from ICE custody and
return them back to Van Nuys.
I am grateful for my team, for working to keep my constituents safe,
and for helping to bring them home.
{time} 1630
However, they never should have been in this position. My
constituents were following the rules and obeying the laws, and ICE
still took them and sent them to Texas to live in horrid conditions.
They were part of the over 68,000 people who have been in ICE
detention, and the kids were part of the over 3,800 children booked
into ICE custody.
ICE is terrorizing families and inflicting unspeakable harm on our
most vulnerable. Despite all of this, Donald Trump and Republicans
continue to refuse to hold ICE accountable. Children, parents, and our
communities are
[[Page H2759]]
not safe if ICE continues to operate as is. To truly protect them, ICE
must be abolished.
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from New York (Mr.
Tonko).
Mr. TONKO. Mr. Speaker, it is an honor to cohost this Special Order
with Congresswoman Dexter. Again, I thank the gentlewoman for her
caring voice.
Obviously, listening to these horrific stories that are impacting our
children in this Nation is very difficult to absorb.
The Department of Health and Human Services Office of Refugee
Resettlement has increased its coordination with ICE. That partnership
is very troublesome. It bothers me to think of what can happen. ORR is
sharing data on prospective guardians for unaccompanied children with
ICE, and then ICE is increasingly using these children as lures to
detain family members.
Our children should not be used as pawns. This, as a civilized
nation, has an image cast to the entire world. A civilized nation
nurtures its children. A civilized nation respects its children. A
civilized nation loves its children. Where is our moral compass here?
Beyond the impact on these children and families, beyond the hurt and
the physical and mental damage, there is an image cast to the entire
world. This uncivilized behavior is a scar on our history. It is one
that indicates that unaccompanied children are now waiting an average
of more than 200 days in ORR detention, despite the many, many family
members who are ready and able to care for them.
That is more than double the highest average seen during the first
Trump administration of some 93 days and, yes, more than six times as
long as the 30-day average seen under the Biden administration.
The Office of Inspector General found that the longer that children
remain in ORR custody, the more likely they are to exhibit mental
health or behavioral issues.
Think about that. We are inflicting damage on children, innocent
children escaping harm in their native land, perhaps, or asking just to
live their version of the American Dream. Longer stays in ORR detention
are leading to more instances of self-harm and suicidal ideation.
We can, and we must, do better.
Mr. Speaker, it is so important that these stories are shared this
afternoon with the American public because they challenge us. They
inspire us to respond, to reach out to our Representatives, and to
speak to this government about the way that it is conducting itself in
regard to children. They are not pawns. They should not be impacted so
severely and have lifetime damage.
We are a better people than that. We are a better nation than that.
We are proud as a country and should maintain that sense of pride by
doing right, by doing just, and by doing fair by all children, our
children.
With that, I see we have been joined by another colleague.
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from California
(Ms. Jacobs).
Ms. JACOBS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today because our country has normalized
something that should never be normal: locking up kids. Under the Trump
administration, ICE has detained thousands of children, many of them
under 5 years old.
As a Representative from San Diego, an immigrant and border
community, I have seen firsthand the consequences of our immigration
system. As someone who has spent my career working on human rights, I
can tell you that this is state-sanctioned child abuse.
These children are not threats. They are not statistics. They are
kids, some just babies and toddlers, who have fled violence, poverty,
and instability. They have done nothing wrong. Many have experienced
trauma before they ever set foot on American soil.
Instead of care and instead of compassion, we are detaining them and
traumatizing them for life.
To be honest, I don't actually care what their parents may or may not
have done. Children should not be punished for their parents' actions.
Mr. Speaker, 2 weeks ago, I went to the Dilley immigration detention
center in Texas, the primary site for family detention in our country.
What I saw and what I heard would rattle any parent, and it should
disturb everyone.
Kids have nightmares so bad that they wake up screaming in the middle
of the night. Teenagers are regressing developmentally and wetting the
bed. The classrooms were empty. The playground was empty. There was no
joy or laughter, just the look of fear and despair in people's eyes.
The mom of a 3-year-old told me that her daughter was anxious and
depressed, but the nurse said that she was fine because she hadn't lost
too much weight yet, so they didn't help her.
This kind of fear and uncertainty doesn't just go away. It will
follow these kids. It will shape their development and leave lasting
scars.
This isn't just my observation. The American Academy of Pediatrics
has said for years that detaining children causes toxic stress that can
permanently alter brain development. Pediatricians call it
institutional harm.
When medical professionals are telling us that what we are doing to
these kids causes the same neurological damage as physical abuse, we
need to stop calling it immigration policy and start calling it for
what it is.
I know immigration is complicated. I know that there are strong
opinions on all sides of this issue, but protecting children should not
be controversial. Ensuring that children are treated with dignity and
care should not be political or partisan. Apparently, it is because the
Republican Party, the so-called profamily party, is complicit in child
abuse.
I won't be complicit. My colleagues and I will not be complicit. We
need to shut down Dilley and end family detention for good. We need to
reject the idea that locking up children and their parents is an
acceptable response to migration.
That means Congress needs to do its job and cut off funding for
family detention and claw back the $75 billion blank check that was
given to ICE and Border Patrol.
While we are at it, not a single committee in this House has held a
hearing on conditions inside family detention facilities, not one.
Republicans control every gavel in this building, and they have
conducted zero oversight of what is being done to children in our
government's custody. If they won't do oversight, we will. When we have
the majority, Dilley will be the first place we go.
Many of us in this Chamber have children of our own. While I don't
have kids yet, I wouldn't be able to live with myself and look my four
nieces and nephews in the eyes if I weren't doing everything in my
power to protect all kids.
Mr. Speaker, I urge all of my colleagues to look their kids in their
eyes tonight and imagine them locked up in these conditions, and then
work with us to end family detention.
Mr. Speaker, I thank Congresswoman Dexter for her leadership on this
issue.
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I spent 20 years taking care of the sickest
members of our community as a critical care and pulmonary physician. I
have seen what happens when people aren't able to get the care that
they need: Preventable illnesses escalate and become deadly.
At Dilley, there have been repeated reports of children's medical
needs not being met, resulting in life-threatening health problems.
That includes a 2-year-old with infected gums that Dilley staff did not
treat for over 23 days, leading her to have a fever and infection, cry
relentlessly, and be forced to have a diet of only liquids.
{time} 1640
It includes an 18-month-old baby who went to the hospital for 10 days
when her oxygen levels were dangerously low and a 10-year-old child
with Hirschsprung's disease who lacked proper medical care, resulting
in no bowel movements for over a month.
Families report something even more disturbing. When they ask for
help, they are dismissed, belittled, and mocked. One person reported
that they were laughed at by guards while vomiting and pleading to see
a doctor.
If any hospital in this country treated children this way, we would
shut it down. We would investigate. We would hold people accountable.
Instead, our tax dollars are funding it. It is reprehensible.
[[Page H2760]]
I call on my colleagues for an immediate end to cruel immigration
enforcement against children. Defund and dismantle ICE.
Mr. Speaker, I yield again to the gentleman from New York (Mr.
Tonko).
Mr. TONKO. Mr. Speaker, again, I appreciate the opportunity for all
of us to share our thoughts here this afternoon.
I am reminded that ICE has been re-detaining children who were
previously approved to stay with family members. It seems as though
cruel has to be the additive to all of these actions. It is not enough
to take that first step and then re-detain and then sponsors are being
asked to provide additional information, including fingerprints and
DNA.
So there is an all-out attempt to dismantle the peace and tranquility
of so many families and to make, again, children, pawns in this
process.
Discharges to sponsors have declined dramatically. Over 5,000
unaccompanied children were released to an individual sponsor back in
January of 2025. What does that number look like now? In April, that
number dropped to just 45. So, again, the cruelty continues.
We see on the news every day the plummeting of the Trump
administration's popularity, and that is pretty much earned. America
disrespects the kind of behavior that is the hallmark of this
administration--creating trauma amongst children and parents. They must
end cruel immigration enforcement against kids now.
I know that we have been joined by our colleague from Texas now to
hear his story.
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I am going to give my colleague just a
moment and tell you about a family who are not immigrants with
children. They are Americans, four Americans. Jackie Merlos and her
children went to the Canadian border with her mother, who had a
visiting visa from Honduras to come and see her sister and her nieces
and nephews who live in Canada as permanent legal residents.
They drove to the Peace Park. They went there to have a family
reunion, a picnic. There was no intention for any misguided actions.
They just wanted to have a picnic and a reunion.
Now, Jackie has an asylum case, an active asylum case. She has lived
in the United States for over 20 years and has an active work permit.
She has done everything right. As they hugged, ICE agents, CBP agents
swarmed the family and detained all of them.
Now, luckily, her sister lives in Canada where they released her
fairly quickly, but Jackie was accused of human trafficking, as if her
sister and her nieces and nephews wanted to come into the United
States. She was kept with her four children, 7-year-old triplets and
their 9-year-old, in a windowless cell at the border in Ferndale,
Washington, for 2 weeks--over 2 weeks.
This is not a facility meant for long-term detention. It is a
facility meant for 48-hours-or-less stays. There are no showers. There
is no kitchen to make food for them. They kept them there.
I had the ability to go and see this family, but I wasn't allowed to
talk to them. We were told that they were being sent back home and that
Jackie had asked for that. It was a lie. Jackie had never signed any
paperwork. She has four U.S. children. She knew she had done everything
right, and she refused. But we were lied to. I, as a U.S.
Congresswoman, was lied to.
Eventually, we had a habeas corpus case, and Jackie was released. Her
children had been released as they were about to deport them.
Let me also say that her husband was taken into detention after her
children were questioned individually, without their mother there, by
CBP agents. They asked where they live and how much money do they make.
Their father was detained from their own home. He was detained to the
Northwest Detention Center.
While he was there, Customs and Border Patrol took pictures of the
children and took them to their father and asked: Is this your child?
They had him sign something. Well, he was signing passport
applications. He reads Spanish. The applications were in English.
Our government was trying to deport, which isn't really a thing at
all, American citizens against the will of their parents, and they lied
to a U.S. Congresswoman about whether or not they wanted to be sent
home. They wouldn't allow me to see Jackie. They wouldn't let me talk
to her. They absolutely were on the border, the fringe of sending them.
They were at SeaTac Airport being sent when we finally got them to
cease and desist.
This is what your taxpayer dollars are paying for. These are U.S.
citizen children with a mother who had done everything right. Shame on
us. This has to stop.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Castro).
Mr. CASTRO of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I thank the Congresswoman for
yielding.
We have seen and we have witnessed the brutality on the streets of
America by ICE. We saw two Americans killed, and many people
brutalized.
Just the other day, in the San Francisco Airport, we saw a mother who
was ripped away from her 9-year-old daughter. We saw that replayed in
courthouses across the country, in neighborhoods, in cities across
America. We have seen that mostly on television or social media as
people have posted it up.
There is another brutality that most Americans have not gotten a
chance to see that Congresswoman Dexter and I have witnessed, that only
Members of Congress and a few others have had a chance to see. It is
also a brutality by ICE. It is the way that children and families are
treated at the Dilley trailer prison in Dilley, Texas.
I have been there multiple times now, and I have seen the suffering
of the young kids who will be traumatized for life. As you know, they
have talked about worms in their food, about being separated from a
parent. There are some there who have no clue why they are there.
Dilley is unique in America in that I can't think of another place
where you would imprison a 5-year-old boy like Liam Ramos who has
committed no crime.
During this discussion and this debate about these prisons, there has
been a temptation to direct the anger at ICE and at the people that
work there, and I certainly understand that. But there is another group
of people that we don't talk about much who are making millions, if not
billions of dollars off of child suffering. As a country, we have made
a decision to commodify child suffering, to allow investors to profit
from child imprisonment, innocent child imprisonment.
{time} 1650
There was a baby at Dilley that was 2 months old. The first time I
went there I asked who the youngest child was, and I was told a 2-month
old baby. Some of the largest asset managers, BlackRock, Vanguard have
stakes in these private prison companies in CoreCivic that runs Dilley
or GO that ran the south Texas ICE processing center where we visited
several weeks ago.
We have to shut down the Dilley Detention Center, that trailer prison
that has done so much damage to the kids and to the families who are
there, kids like the mariachi boys who came to this Capitol at the
invitation of their Congresswoman and performed their mariachi music,
toured the White House, and yet, along with their parents were thrown
into this trailer prison in Dilley.
Fortunately, because of an ensemble effort and so many Americans that
spoke up, Members of Congress that spoke up, this wonderful group of
pediatric doctors, mostly women who have been very active in pleading
people's cases, they were released. Also, fortunately, at Dilley the
first time I went there in January there were 1,100 people there. The
next time there were 450 people. On Monday, there were only 102 people
still at the Dilley trailer prison.
Keep speaking up. We need to shut Dilley down.
Ms. DEXTER. Mr. Speaker, I again thank all of my colleagues who
joined us today and who spoke with such clarity and urgency. What we
heard this afternoon makes one thing clear: Immigration enforcement
against children is inhumane and unnecessary.
Families can and should be able to navigate their immigration cases
together and in community, with the support of loved ones and legal
service providers.
Detention harms children. It harms their physical health. It harms
their mental health. Even after they are released, that trauma stays
with them for life.
[[Page H2761]]
For so many children, the harm starts long before detention ever
happens. It starts with fear.
For months now, every single school group that has come into my
office or that I have visited has raised ICE as one of its top
concerns. Elementary students, middle schoolers, high schoolers, even
college students, for all of them, ICE is their top concern.
At a time when teachers aren't getting paid enough, and the
Department of Education is getting gutted, young people are coming to
Congress and asking: How can we stop our friends from being taken away?
This administration is traumatizing an entire generation. That is why
we are here today to call for an end to cruel immigration enforcement
against children.
End child detention. Defund and dismantle ICE, and save our children
from this nightmare.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. CARTER of Louisiana. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak on a
moral crisis unfolding in our country. One that demands the attention
of my Republican colleagues and the American people.
Last month, in Portland, Oregon, a seven-year-old girl was detained
outside an urgent care clinic while her family sought medical help.
Just weeks earlier, a five-year-old was detained while walking home
from school in Columbia Heights, Minnesota. These are not isolated
incidents. These are children, frightened, vulnerable, and in need of
care, caught in an indiscriminate immigration enforcement dragnet.
After their arrests, both children were transferred with their
families to the Dilley Family Detention Center in Texas, where reports
detail inadequate medical care, limited drinking water, poor nutrition,
and little access to education. These are conditions no child should
endure, let alone in the custody of the United States government.
Although public outcry and legal intervention led to their release,
hundreds of other children remain detained. Many are held for months--
over 180 days on average--in facilities never designed for long-term
care. They suffer deep psychological harm: anxiety, depression, and
trauma compounded by separation and uncertainty.
Policies implemented through the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR)
are now effectively prolonging detention. Barriers to family
reunification, like invasive sponsor requirements and information-
sharing with enforcement agencies, trap children in custody, often
indefinitely. Some are even pressured to abandon their legal rights and
return to dangerous conditions.
This is not who we are. Children seeking safety should not be treated
as enforcement targets. They should be protected, cared for, and given
a fair chance to pursue their legal rights.
Congress must act. We must conduct oversight, end family detention,
restore due process protections, and ensure children are placed in the
least restrictive settings.
History will judge us not by our rhetoric, but by whether we chose
compassion over cruelty. Let us choose wisely.
____________________