The U.S. government is violating international human rights law by severely mistreating immigrants in ICE custody at a detention camp in Texas, according to a report by Human Rights Watch and the American Civil Liberties Union.
The findings stem from interviews with 71 detainees at Camp East Montana, a privately run tent city designed to hold up to 5,000 migrants on the Fort Bliss Army post in El Paso, Texas.
While the Trump Administration has said they are targeting criminals for detention, Human Rights Watch attorney Angélica César said most of the detainees they encountered at Camp East Montana did not have criminal histories. Coming to the U.S. without authorization is a civil offense.
“The majority of the people that we interviewed were people who were detained following traffic stops,” César said. “Nearly all of them told us they had work permits or other forms of authorization to be in the United States.”
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The report documents cases of excessive force and indiscriminate beatings by guards, including on ICE charter flights that bring immigrants to the detention center.
Migrants in custody shared accounts of being denied life-saving medication and other medical care, both physical and mental, at Camp East Montana.
“I sometimes look at my bed sheets and I wonder if it would be easier to hang myself instead of trying to survive this torture,” a 28-year-old immigrant from Honduras held at the camp for more than five months is quoted as saying.
The findings echo a Scripps News ICE Inc. investigation shortly after the camp opened in 2025 that found detainees soon suffering from inadequate medical and hygiene care while private companies under government contract earned revenue operating the detention center.
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Conditions have remained inhumane, César said. Detainees are unable to communicate with family and attorneys, violating international human rights law that forbids governments from blocking a detainee’s access to legal representation, she said.
“People are essentially held outside the protection of the law,” César said. “They are essentially cut off from the outside world.”
The report also claims detainees can go weeks without recreational activities or seeing the sun. They must use bathrooms sometimes covered in human waste, and endure living quarters that flood.
In many cases, detainees will finally abandon their legal immigration cases and volunteer for deportation only to find themselves sent by the U.S. government to unfamiliar countries, the report says.
The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to questions about the human rights report but has disputed claims of poor conditions at the camp in the past, even as government inspectors have found dozens of violations of detention standards.
