Seizures, Chest Pain and Long Holds at a Phoenix ICE Facility

ICE agents called 911 to request medical help for detainees at the temporary hold facility inside the Phoenix ICE District Office on 11 occasions between December 2025 and March 2026, including for a pregnant 27-year-old woman with severe abdominal pain who was taken to St. Joseph’s Hospital, according to recordings and records obtained by the Arizona Mirror. The midtown Phoenix facility has 10 holding cells that can hold upwards of 150 people, with no beds, no on-site medical services, limited food and no shower accessible to detainees, and ICE says it is meant to hold people for no more than 12 hours. ICE data obtained by the Deportation Data Project show detainees were held an average of 25 hours in the first three months of 2026, up from roughly 19 hours in 2025 and eight to 10 hours between 2022 and 2024. A DHS spokesperson said ICE is “not holding detainees for more than 12 hours” at what it called a processing facility, not a detention facility.