U.S. News

Washington state health and workplace inspectors have repeatedly been denied entry to a for-profit federal immigration detention center in Tacoma, where detainees have filed hundreds of complaints over issues like neglected hygiene, poor food and inadequate medical care.

Inspectors attempted to enter the facility under House Bill 1470, a state law passed in 2023 that was meant to bring more state oversight to the Northwest ICE Processing Center. Detainees have held hunger strikes in protest of the facility’s conditions for at least a decade, including one late last year that stretched more than two weeks.

The GEO Group, the company running the facility under a contract with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said they denied entry to state officials in late 2023 at the direction of ICE. State officials said GEO Group told them they could not enter due to “litigation.”