By Victoria Albert

Columbia University student Mahmoud Khalil is being held in an immigration detention facility in Louisiana more than a thousand miles away from where the 30-year-old was arrested in New York in early March.

Here's what to know about the Central Louisiana ICE Processing Center, where he's being detained while he fights to stay in the U.S.

Why was Khalil sent to Louisiana?

A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement official said the agency sent him to the facility in Jena, La., a small town of about 4,000 people, because of a lack of bedspace in northeast centers and a bedbug infestation at a facility in New Jersey.

Immigration detention centers aren't intended as a punishment for breaking the law. The government hasn't charged Khalil, a green-card holder, with a crime.

Legal observers say the relocation could give the government an advantage if the case is appealed out of the immigration court system. The appellate court for the Fifth Circuit, which includes Louisiana, has legal precedent that is less friendly to immigrants.

Civil-rights groups described the move to Louisiana as an often-used government strategy to isolate detainees from their community and legal team.

"We see it as a black-hole destination where ICE secludes people and isolates them from legal resources, their family, their community, and is able to operate with near impunity," said Sarah Decker, a staff lawyer for the group Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights, who has represented clients in the facility.

Officials initially tried to make Khalil's lawyers wait 10 days to speak with him, they said in filings. A judge ordered the center to provide earlier access. Khalil's lawyers have fought for him to be moved back to New York to be closer to them and his wife, a U.S. citizen who is pregnant.

A Louisiana ICE official said detainees have access to telephones and tablets that can be used for recorded video calls from their housing units and soundproof booths for legal calls.

What are conditions like at the facility?

Detainees are typically housed in large rooms with 50 to 80 people in rows of metal bunk beds, according to lawyers and rights advocates. Currently, only men live at the 1,160-bed facility, which has a field for detainees to play soccer, they said.

The residents are woken around 3:30 a.m. for breakfast at 4 a.m., followed by lunch at 10 a.m. and dinner at 4 p.m., advocates say.

A 2024 report evaluating conditions at immigration facilities across the state described the food as meager, highly processed and regularly spoiled.

A representative for GEO Group, a private-prison company that runs the facility, said its services are subject to federal detention standards and are independently accredited by other groups.

The detainees can sign up for volunteer work shifts that often pay $1 a day, lawyers and civil-rights groups said. Those funds can be used to buy food and other items from a facility store or to pay for calls with family. At the South Louisiana ICE Processing Center, operated by the same private-prison company as the Jena facility, a bag of Doritos is $9, according to the report.

Khalil's wife said in court documents that Khalil told her officials were slow to provide him with his ulcer medication. She said he hasn't been able to eat much because of the stress of detention. The GEO Group representative said it provides round-the-clock access to medical care, as well as access to recreational amenities.

Who is in charge of the facility and how is it rated?

GEO Group, one of the major for-profit private prison companies in the U.S., operates the facility on a day-to-day basis. ICE maintains oversight of operations.

ICE's Office of Professional Responsibility gave the Jena facility an overall "superior" rating in its latest annual review. It said investigators interviewed 49 detainees, none of whom reported allegations of discrimination, mistreatment or abuse.

Advocates say such inspections don't capture the full picture. In the 2024 report, immigration-rights advocates said detainees at the Jena center have alleged sexual and physical abuse and denial of hygiene products and medication.

ACLU Louisiana Legal Director Nora Ahmed said the conditions at Louisiana immigration facilities are designed to persuade migrants to give up their efforts to stay in the country.

"The fact that you are here without access to counsel, without access to your family, without access or the ability to call everyone that you need to back home because you don't have the commissary funds to do that, " she said.

The GEO Group representative said it strongly disagrees with allegations that it mistreats detainees, adding that it is required to comply with federal standards.

"These allegations are part of a longstanding, politically motivated, and radical campaign to abolish ICE and end federal immigration detention by attacking the federal government's immigration facility contractors," the spokesperson said. ICE didn't respond to requests for comment.

How long will Khalil be at the center? Could he leave?

Khalil's fight to stay in the country and leave the facility is playing out in two places: immigration court in Louisiana and federal court in New Jersey. He also has the option of giving up his efforts to remain in the U.S., advocacy groups said, though that doesn't guarantee his immediate release.

The State Department says Khalil is deportable under a seldom-used provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act. Khalil argues his detention is retaliation for protected speech for his role in pro-Palestinian demonstrations last spring.

If an immigration judge grants bond, the government could appeal to the Board of Immigration Appeals. If that happened, Khalil would likely remain at the detention center until the appeal is heard, usually about six months, said Chris Kinnison, a Louisiana-based lawyer who has represented roughly 200 clients at Jena.

Write to Victoria Albert at victoria.albert@wsj.com

This explanatory article may be periodically updated.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

April 01, 2025 09:00 ET (13:00 GMT)

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