ICE Detainees Claim They’re Served Low-Quality Meals, Are Left Hungry
USA Today reports on food quality at a Louisiana ICE hub, where detainees say they are subject to a diet of processed foods that are often expired and never fully sate their hunger. A Guardian report highlights ICE detention conditions of perpetual twilight under fluorescent lights.
USA Today:
ICE Says It Provides 'Proper Meals.' Detainees See Crystalized Jelly, Rancid Beans And Iced Bologna
Months after leaving immigration detention, Camila Muñoz can still remember the ice cream scooper used to ladle food onto plastic trays and the "sour feeling" after every meal. Hunger. "You have to eat no matter what, or the night is going to get you," she told USA TODAY. "We were really hungry." In Louisiana – a major hub of the Trump administration's mass deportation effort – detainees and their representatives say people in custody are going hungry on a diet of processed foods that are barely edible, often expired and never filling. (Villagran, 10/19)
The Guardian:
Dim Days, Bright Nights: A Hidden Cruelty Of Ice Detention
At the Northwest Ice Processing Center in Tacoma, Washington, about 1,500 people in immigration detention await their day in court. Most are held for months, living not by the rising and setting sun but under the perpetual twilight of fluorescent lights. “We couldn’t tell if it was day or night,” said one former detainee who spent 10 months at the facility and whom the Guardian is not naming for fear of retaliation from US Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (Ice) and the Geo Group, the private company that operates the detention center. “The lights were on 24/7. We maybe saw the sun twice a week.” Windows were coated in dark paint, and people made eye masks with their socks, he recalled. (Peeples, 10/20)
Newsweek:
Children Zip-Tied During ICE Raid On Family Event In Idaho
Children were reportedly zip-tied during a multi-agency law enforcement raid in Wilder, Idaho, as hundreds of people were detained and police fired rubber bullets. The operation took place on October 19 at La Catedral Arena, a horse racing venue west of Boise, according to The Idaho Statesman. (Rahman, 10/21)
Chicago Tribune:
ICE Arrests Chicago Man Whose Teenage Daughter Is Fighting Cancer
Ofelia Torres has spent almost every day of the past month at Lurie Children’s Hospital, where the 16-year-old Lake View High School student is fighting cancer. After a tough few weeks where the disease spread through her body and doctors inserted a drain in her abdomen to relieve fluid, the Torres family worked with her oncologist to arrange a short getaway over the weekend, where she and three of her closest friends could enjoy a Saturday of simple pleasures and normalcy before a scheduled return to the hospital and chemotherapy. (Pratt, 10/21)
More health news from the Trump administration —
Bloomberg:
US Taps Ex-Defense Official To Run Health Tech Moonshot Agency
The Trump administration chose a new leader for a federal health research funding organization that focuses on high-risk, high-reward programs, after firing its previous head in February. Alicia Jackson, a health technology entrepreneur who used to work for the Defense Department, was appointed director of the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health, according to the Department of Health and Human Services, confirming an earlier Bloomberg News report. (Griffin and Swetlitz, 10/21)
The Washington Post:
Trump Administration Seeks To Move Special Education Program To New Agency
The Trump administration is exploring moving the $15 billion program that supports students with disabilities to a different agency within the federal government as it works to close the Education Department altogether, a department official said Tuesday. The effort comes on the heels of the agency’s decision this month to lay off the vast majority of employees working on special-education services and months after Education Secretary Linda McMahon talked about moving the program to the Department of Health and Human Services. Her goal is to fulfill President Donald Trump’s promise to close the Education Department and move its functions to other parts of the government. (Meckler, 10/21)
Stat:
New DTC Business Drug Sale Models Mix Lower Insurance, Discounts
As pharma companies and President Trump tout initiatives to sell branded medications directly to cash-paying consumers, some entrepreneurs have seized on a potential business opportunity — pitching a new model for employers to help their workers pay for medications without using insurance. (Chen, 10/22)
