ICE Detaining People in Hidden Sites Beyond Legal Time Limits, Investigation Shows

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has increasingly held people for days or weeks inside small, undisclosed holding facilities despite internal rules limiting confinement to a matter of hours, according to a The Guardian investigation.

The findings indicate widespread violations of agency policy, minimal oversight, and conditions that advocates say raise serious safety and due-process concerns.

The Guardian reviewed federal booking data from September 2023 through late July and found that ICE has used at least 170 holding sites nationwide, including inside 25 field offices. These sites are typically bare concrete rooms without beds and are meant for short-term processing.

Until June, ICE's own rules limited confinement in such rooms to 12 hours. A June memo increased the limit to three days, but the investigation found people continued to be held for longer — in some cases, much longer.

At a holding facility located on the 10th floor of a federal building in Manhattan, average detention times rose nearly 600% after the June rule change. In one case, a 62-year-old man was held there for roughly two and a half months. Data showed at least 63 others were detained longer than a week at the same site between Donald Trump's inauguration and late July.

The Guardian found no evidence of routine audits or inspections at these facilities. Attorneys are generally denied entry, and ICE has said the sites are not formally considered detention centers, exempting them from standards that apply elsewhere. Neither ICE nor the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) provided comment in time for publication.

A former ICE official involved in oversight, speaking anonymously, said the facilities were never intended for stays exceeding 12 hours and warned that prolonged confinement increases the risk of sexual abuse and medical neglect. "You're just putting them all in there with minimal oversight," the person said.

Officials have cited surging arrests, limited detention capacity, and backlogged immigration courts to justify increased reliance on these rooms. Advocates say the June policy shift was designed to shield the agency from legal liability. "This is ICE trying to give themselves a buffer to keep holding people in conditions they know are unsafe," said Amelia Dagen of the Amica Center for Immigrant Rights to The Guardian.

Conditions inside the holding rooms are largely hidden. Leaked footage from the New York City facility showed more than 20 people sharing a brightly lit concrete room with little privacy and only foil blankets. Detainees reported going days without showers, clean clothing, or adequate access to counsel. A federal judge later ordered improvements, prompting ICE to distribute sleeping mats, meals, and toothbrushes and to permit legal consultations.

Additional reporting in recent weeks highlights broader concerns about ICE's detention practices. A joint Harvard University–Physicians for Human Rights report published on October 11 found that immigration facilities have placed nearly 14,000 people in prolonged solitary confinement since April 2024, often for weeks at a time — a practice the report described as psychological torture under U.N. standards.

Advocates and former officials argue the expanding use of hidden holding sites and long isolation periods reflects a system with few safeguards. "There is a total lack of oversight," said Paige Austin of Make the Road New York, calling the restricted access to counsel "a way of preventing oversight, transparency and accountability."