Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons issued nationwide memo requiring 48-hour notice and named-detainee ID for congressional oversight visits

On May 12, 2026, Acting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Todd Lyons issued a nationwide policy memo requiring members of Congress to identify detainees by name and to submit signed consent forms at least two business days before interviewing those detainees during oversight visits to ICE detention facilities. Lawmakers first learned of the new policy that same day, when California Representatives Mike Levin and Sara Jacobs made a surprise oversight visit to the Otay Mesa Detention Center in San Diego and were handed the memo after asking to speak with people held there.

Because members of Congress cannot learn who is detained at a facility before they arrive, the named-detainee requirement effectively prevents lawmakers from arranging to interview specific detainees and converts oversight visits into inspections of physical infrastructure only. Federal appropriations law bars the use of appropriated funds to prevent a member of Congress from entering and inspecting a Department of Homeland Security detention facility; the memo's advance-notice and named-identification conditions raise the same concern by conditioning meaningful access on information lawmakers do not have.

The policy followed a separate, earlier ICE requirement of seven days' advance notice for facility visits, which a federal appellate court had declined to reinstate days before this memo issued. According to the Los Angeles Times, which first reported the memo, the guidance applied to all congressional oversight visits nationwide rather than to any single facility.