On the 10th floor of a federal building in Lower Manhattan, there is a holding area where immigration authorities have typically held a few dozen immigrants at a time for a few hours before transferring them to detention centers.
But as the Trump administration expands its immigration crackdown, the space has become overcrowded and people sleep sprawled on the floor, sometimes for days, according to those who have spent time there.
Descriptions of the conditions at the center, the New York City field office of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, have prompted several congressional Democrats to demand that they be allowed inside for oversight purposes. Those demands have been denied.
On Friday, nine New York City Democrats escalated their efforts to get onto the 10th floor by sending a letter to Kristi Noem, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, which includes the immigration agency, known as ICE. In the letter, they accuse the immigration authorities of violating federal laws that allow members of Congress to tour facilities where migrants are being held.
From New Jersey to California, ICE premises have turned into political battlegrounds over President Trump’s immigration agenda, leading to the arrests of several Democratic officials.
“Congressional oversight is essential to bring transparency to the conduct of the Department of Homeland Security,” the lawmakers say in the letter. “Given the overaggressive and excessive force used to handcuff and detain elected officials in public, DHS’s refusal to allow members of Congress to observe the conditions for immigrants behind closed doors begs the obvious question: what are you hiding?”
The letter is signed by Representatives Dan Goldman, Jerrold Nadler, Adriano Espaillat, Nydia Velázquez, Ritchie Torres, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Grace Meng, Yvette Clarke and Gregory Meeks.
The lawmakers also said that immigration authorities were playing word games by arguing that the 10th floor was not technically a detention facility despite migrants being held there temporarily.
The 41-floor office building at 26 Federal Plaza, which also houses one of the city’s immigration courts, has become a flashpoint as federal agents arrest migrants showing up for routine immigration court hearings and appointments in recent weeks.
Brad Lander, the New York City comptroller and a Democratic candidate for mayor, was arrested there by federal agents on Tuesday as he escorted a migrant whom the agents were trying to arrest.
Many of the migrants are taken to the 10th floor, where there are four holding cells, along with desks staffed by ICE officers responsible for processing the detainees’ transfers to detention facilities outside the city, according to those who have been held there and their lawyers.
Detainees are typically divided by gender in the cells, which have bathrooms and long benches built into the walls but no beds, according to one former ICE official who worked at the center and spoke on the condition of anonymity.
The cells are not meant for overnight stays, and they have filled up as ICE makes more arrests, leading to reports of unsanitary conditions and people sleeping on floors.
Mr. Espaillat and Ms. Velázquez were denied access when they showed up there on June 8. An agency spokeswoman said then that the building was not a detention center but that they would have been given a tour had they not arrived unannounced.
On Wednesday, ICE denied access to Mr. Goldman — who said he had told the agency twice that he planned to visit — and to Mr. Nadler.
They were met in the building’s lobby by the agency’s deputy field director in the city, William Joyce, who acknowledged in a brief exchange that some of the detainees had spent several days on the 10th floor, sleeping on the floor or on benches.
The congressmen argued that that made the area a “detention facility,” giving them the right, as members of Congress, to inspect it at any time.
Mr. Joyce, who said his superiors had told him to deny the lawmakers entry, insisted it was a “processing facility” and that those who stayed overnight were “in transit” to different locations.
Federal law allows members of Congress to enter and conduct oversight at “any facility operated by or for the Department of Homeland Security used to detain or otherwise house aliens.” But ICE has said in official guidance that its field offices fall outside the law’s requirements because “ICE does not house aliens at field offices.”
The letter to Ms. Noem argues that Mr. Joyce’s admission that the field office was effectively housing migrants, even temporarily, meant it should be open to congressional visits.
“When individuals are deprived of their liberty in a secure facility for multiple days, they are unquestionably being ‘detained’ or ‘housed’ under the plain language” of the law, the letter says.
In a statement, Tricia McLaughlin, a Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman, reiterated that 26 Federal Plaza was not a detention center.
“These congressional members do not have the authority to disrupt ongoing law enforcement activities and sensitive law enforcement materials,” she said.
Mr. Goldman said in an interview that he was not trying to “create hullabaloo or create a chaotic situation” by trying to visit the 10th floor.
“We were trying to give them every opportunity to allow us to do our jobs, and they still refused,” he said. “We’re very concerned about the overcrowding, the sanitation issues — food and water and hygiene — and basic treatment of these people who have been ripped away from their families and their communities when they’re trying to do things the right way.”
Gwyneth Hesser, an immigration lawyer at Bronx Defenders, said one of her clients, a man from Colombia, had been held on the 10th floor for three days after being arrested following an immigration court hearing this month.
The man, like many who have been held at 26 Federal Plaza, was transferred to a detention center in Newark that has also attracted complaints, about overcrowding and dismal meals served at irregular hours. The poor conditions, Ms. Hesser said, have been a particular problem for her client, who she said is diabetic and whose blood sugar levels have spiked.
“He said they don’t see any sunlight, like they can leave their cell, but they never go outside,” she said of the conditions at the center, known as Delaney Hall.
A group of detainees held at Delaney Hall staged an uprising last week that led to the escape of four men, three of whom have since been captured. The Department of Homeland Security has insisted there was no unrest at the facility.
Nate Schweber contributed reporting.
