US Senator Andy Kim, a Democrat from New Jersey, said he was pepper-sprayed by federal agents during a protest outside the Delaney Hall immigration detention centre in Newark on Monday. The incident occurred amid demonstrations against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) over conditions at the facility, where detainees have reportedly been on hunger strike.
Video posted on social media showed Kim receiving aid from a volunteer who poured water into his eyes. Kim told USA Today that he had been inside Delaney Hall to inspect conditions and emerged to a “standoff” between protesters and ICE agents, who had deployed an armoured vehicle as a barricade. He said he lined up in front of the vehicle to de-escalate the situation, but ICE pushed through the crowd, using pepper balls and spray.
“People were getting tackled and brought to the ground,” Kim said. “I tried to do whatever I could standing in the middle to keep people safe.” In a post on X, he described the scene as “chaos” and called the facility a failure, urging its closure.
Protests at the site have been ongoing since Friday, with allegations of detainees being denied fresh food, medical care, and working air conditioning. On Tuesday, detainees released a letter asserting they were on hunger and work strikes, demanding a meeting with Governor Mikie Sherrill, who has said she was denied access to the facility.
The Department of Homeland Security, ICE’s parent agency, denied the hunger strike claims and said conditions at Delaney Hall were not substandard. However, advocates and protesters, including Reverend Erich Kussman, described the environment as “terrible”, with reports of rotten food and a putrid smell of sewage and chemicals.
