Migrants Held in ICE El Paso Detention Center Decry Human Rights Violations: 'This Is Very Horrible'

Detained migrants at an El Paso processing center who are awaiting deportation report are decrying human rights violations, including lack of access to legal counsel. Some are saying it is worse than what the general public generally sees and reads in the media.

"The truth is, this is very horrible, it is not as it is painted," Derwinson Dudamel Escalona, a migrant being held at El Paso, told Noticias Telemundo about the facility, where Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) holds hundreds of undocumented migrants.

"They say we have medicine, that we have this and that" it's a complete lie," the 32-year-old Venezuelan, who has been detained in the Texas facility for more than three months told the news outlet via phone call. "I don't want to be locked up here any longer, may it be God's will," he added.

Another migrant also being detained there described a lack of food, space and overall human rights violations.

"Here, our rights are violated with food. They only give us bread, and that doesn't feed us. This place is also overcrowded, there are people sleeping on the floor, and it's complete chaos," said Eduardo Pozo Leal, another Venezuelan migrant in El Paso.

While it remains unclear exactly how many migrants are currently being housed in El Paso, overcrowding in detention centers has been a constant issue faced by ICE, which under the Trump administration is seeking to carry out the largest deportation operation in American history.

According to federal data compiled by Syracuse University's TRAC research center, as of April 20, 2025, ICE had 49,184 people in custody nationwide, nearly half of whom had no criminal history. The majority of migrants in custody during this fiscal year were held in ICE facilities in Texas.

Such accounts from migrants were recently backed by a report from Amnesty International in a report. The recent report, titled "Dehumanized by Design: Human Rights Violations in El Paso," showed the results and findings from an April 10 visit to the processing center.

The report concludes that the El Paso facility has "substandard or inhumane detention conditions" that do not meet international— or ICE— standards for detention as outlined in the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, also known as the Nelson Mandela Rules, and the ICE Performance Based National Detention Standards.

Likewise, most interviewees told the organization that they lacked legal representation and had no regular access to legal guidance. Several didn't even have information about their own cases, which added to the mental and physical toll they already face.

"Many individuals... expressed that one of the hardest parts of being in detention was the uncertainty about how long they would have to remain in detention, and many expressed frustration, hopelessness and concerns about whether they would ever receive a decision about their situation," the report states. "The constantly changing legal and political landscape also contributes to fear for themselves and their families."

As for how migrants were detained, the report concludes that most of the arrests were arbitrary and "filled with rights violations." It also states that authorities at the center often threaten detainees with being sent to prisons in El Salvador or to the Guantanamo Naval Base, "as a fear and intimidation tactic and/or disciplinary measure."