Judge Orders DHS: Give Minn. Detainees Swift Access to Lawyers Before Transfers

A federal judge has ordered the Department of Homeland Security to give immigrants detained in Minnesota access to attorneys immediately after they are taken into custody and before they are transferred out of state.

U.S. District Judge Nancy Brasel issued the emergency restraining order Thursday, finding detainees at the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building faced so many logistical barriers to contacting legal counsel that it was likely the Department of Homeland Security had stepped on their constitutional rights.

The order is temporary, and will last for two weeks unless the judge extends it.

“It appears that in planning for Operation Metro Surge, the government failed to plan for the constitutional rights of its civil detainees,” Brasel wrote in the 41-page ruling. She rejected arguments by DHS attorneys that suggested changes to improve access would lead to “chaos.”

“The Constitution does not permit the government to arrest thousands of individual and then disregard their constitutional rights because it would be too challenging to honor those rights,” she wrote.

Department of Homeland Security officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Advocates for Human Rights and a detainee sued late last month, contending people held at Whipple on the outskirts of Minneapolis are denied adequate access to lawyers, even as they face the prospect of deportation. Attorney Jeffrey Dubner told Brasel that detainees are allowed to make phone calls, but ICE personnel are typically nearby.

Justice Department attorney Christina Parascandola told the court last week that people detained at the facility have access to counsel and unmonitored phone calls at any time and for as long as they need. She conceded that she had never entered the Whipple facility.