ICE’s Delaney Hall is being slammed with lawsuits

As protests inside and outside of Newark’s Delaney Hall continue into their second week, federal, state, and local officials are vying over the future of the privately-run ICE detention center and former prison in New Jersey. 

This morning, Newark Mayor Ras Baraka held a press conference, calling for the facility’s closure and threatening further legal action against GEO Group, the company that operates it. A few hours later, the state of New Jersey also sued the private prison giant, seeking a court order for full access by health inspectors, who since Wednesday have lacked it.

ICE and Homeland Security agents beat and arrested dozens of protesters outside Delaney last week, until state police took over the area on Friday, eventually pushing protesters blocks away into a designated ‘protest zone’ as New Jersey Democratic Gov. Mikie Sherrill implored activists to “lower the temperature.”

Beginning Sunday, under Baraka’s orders, the city of Newark established a curfew for the half-mile radius around Delaney Hall—and that evening, state police promptly tear-gassed and arrested even more protesters and members of the press than ICE agents had done earlier in the week. Meanwhile, people detained inside said they experienced physical violence from guards as retribution for speaking out. 

At a Tuesday press conference outside Delaney Hall, Baraka remarked that state police’s “training was not appropriate for what was happening in this area at the time” and objected to tactics that “kind of resembled what ICE was doing in the first place.”

Baraka announced that Newark municipal police, who the mayor contended are “more trained in de-escalation,” would be taking over the area. “I might say that we probably should have done that earlier, jumped in and had a louder voice,” he said. 

The mayor’s office did not immediately respond to questions on why local government delayed involvement.

“I think it was escalated the minute ICE showed up on the scene,” Baraka, who was arrested last year while attempting to enter the facility, added. “We obviously thought that the interactions between ICE agents, Homeland Security, state police and residents were troubling.” He also pointed to conditions inside Delaney, referencing a detained person who had a miscarriage and was not given medical attention.

The city of Newark has been fighting in court for the past year to shut down Delaney Hall, alleging that GEO Group failed to get the proper permits to reopen the facility as a detention center in 2025. Now, Baraka said, the cities plans to expand that lawsuit to include safety violations. “This is not just…a code enforcement dispute,” Baraka said. “This is a dispute about human lives.”

Hundreds of Delaney Hall detainees have been engaged in hunger and labor strikes for nearly two weeks. They’ve turned down GEO Group–provided food and refused to work as janitorial, maintenance, and kitchen laborers within the facility—work for which they are paid as little as a dollar a day. They have four main demands: an end to coercive pressure from ICE agents to “self-deport,” a review of their immigration cases and habeas corpus petitions, an opportunity to speak with Gov. Mikie Sherrill in person inside Delaney Hall, and ultimately, their release from ICE custody.

New Jersey officials have largely not acknowledged these demands—including Baraka, who did not immediately respond to a request for comment, and Sherrill, who has not met with immigrants inside Delaney Hall or fully funded their legal defense. Regardless, activists say their organizing inside and outside the facility has led to some victories. 

Cosecha New Jersey, an advocacy group in communication with people inside Delaney Hall, posted on Instagram that “an increased number of people have been released from detention,” since the strike began, including all pregnant people incarcerated there, “thanks to the urgency and pressure from families and the public.” About a thousand people, however, remain locked inside.

In a social media post Tuesday, the Department of Homeland Security characterized New Jersey’s lawsuit against GEO Group as “frivolous.” 

“Just last week on May 28, four representatives of the New Jersey State Health Department arrived at approximately 11:00 AM,” the DHS X account posted. “They entered the facility and inspected the foodservice department.” That inspection, however, left out the medical unit, sleeping areas, and toilets, according to a press release from New Jersey’s Attorney General—and the state’s lawsuit stipulates that officials must be allowed to inspect the whole building.

“We believe that the way GEO Group opened up Delaney Hall was in contravention to municipal laws and state laws from the very beginning,” Baraka said in his Tuesday press conference. “We’re going to argue even further that this should be closed because of health and human safety.”