GEO Group cancels Delaney Hall family visits, bars Sen. Kim from speaking with detainees

On Saturday, June 6, 2026, GEO Group, the private contractor that operates ICE's roughly 1,000-bed Delaney Hall detention facility in Newark, New Jersey, canceled all family visitation for the day, turning away spouses and children at the gate, according to Mother Jones. The same day, U.S. Sen. Andy Kim (D-N.J.) arrived for a congressional oversight visit — his first time back at the facility since federal agents pepper-sprayed him outside it on May 25 — and was admitted, but guards refused to let him speak with any detainees. "They told me that if I were to speak to any detainees, the oversight tour would immediately be cut off and stopped," Kim said as he left the facility. "This is impeding my ability to lawfully do the oversight that I'm legally allowed to do, and I told them I thought this was a deep breach of my responsibilities and what the American people are demanding."

Walking through a women's housing unit, Kim said detainees waved frantically and pointed him toward a woman curled up on a bed, "clearly in some pain and agony." Guards did not answer when he asked what was happening to her. Kim said detainees moved to medical units have no way of contacting their families, and that ICE will not tell relatives which hospital a detainee has been taken to, citing security concerns. The visit came more than two weeks into a hunger and labor strike by detainees over conditions including spoiled food, denial of medical care, and failed sanitation — and amid a documented pattern of access denials at Delaney Hall: Gov. Mikie Sherrill was refused entry on May 25, the state of New Jersey sued GEO Group on June 2 after health inspectors were denied full access, and families reported being turned away on June 1 even after the governor said visitation would resume.

Federal appropriations law guarantees members of Congress access to DHS detention facilities for oversight purposes without prior notice. Conditioning a senator's admission on having no contact with the people whose treatment he came to inspect leaves the oversight right formally honored but functionally empty, while the simultaneous cancellation of family visits closed off the other main channel by which conditions inside the facility reach the public. GEO Group did not provide Kim further information about the woman in distress, and DHS has previously defended its handling of access to the facility by citing safety and security concerns.