Reps. Omar, Morrison, Craig denied entry at ICE detention facility

Three of Minnesota’s Democratic members of Congress were denied a request to tour a federal immigration detention facility the morning of Jan. 10. Federal officials say they needed to make request seven days in advance.

Reps. Kelly Morrison, Angie Craig and Ilhan Omar arrived at the Whipple Federal Building at Fort Snelling about 9:30 a.m. to tour the operations. The representatives say they were invited to tour the facility by a former acting director.

Minutes after they entered, Omar said she was told the offer was rescinded and that they were denied access from the rest of the building.

“We’re here because we’re members of Congress. We have every right and responsibility if we’re doing our jobs go be here today, to see what the conditions are in that detention center,” Craig said afterward.

The visit was improper and out of compliance with policies and court orders that mandate members of Congress must notify ICE at least seven days in advance of Congressional visits, according to Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary of Homeland Security. The denial was also for safety concerns, she added.

“On January 10, Representatives Ilhan Omar, Angie Craig, and Kelly Morrison led a group of protestors to the Minneapolis ICE facility, the morning after a mob of violent rioters attacked, broke into, and destroyed parts of several hotels in downtown Minneapolis, with the explicit goal of “hunting down” ICE officers who they believed may have been staying there,“ the McLaughlin statement reads.

The attempted visit comes amid several days of protests following the Jan. 7 fatal shooting of Renee Good by ICE agent Jonathan Ross.

When Morrison described the thwarted visit she said they were met at a gate by ICE agents in “clearly aggressive” posture.

When they identified themselves as Congress members and showed their congressional pins, the agents still refused entry.

Eventually, Morrison said a local law enforcement officer escorted them in: “The three of us were given very brief entry where they were holding detainees.”

Morrison said she saw men on benches with their heads in hands in the roughly three minutes they were inside before quickly being escorted out.

Morrison said they were performing constitutionally-protected congressional oversight of a federal building. But the unnamed ICE officials refused to take them back into the detainee holding area, saying that the funding for the ICE surge came last summer’s tax and spending bill. Neither of the three members voted for the measure.

But Morrison said the officials refused further entry. She said Craig invoked a December federal court decision in Washington, D.C. demanding that members of Congress be allowed entry into federal facilities, but the agents in charge declined to accept this rationalization.

During their brief visit to the detainee area, Morrison said she saw a “series of single rooms” housing individuals but without beds or blankets. They also appeared to lack shower facilities.

On the opposite side of the room, sat 20 young men on a long bench.