Ansari says she requested visits with 3 people in immigration detention. ICE denied all 3

U.S. Rep. Yassamin Ansari says she was denied access to three people she was trying to visit at the Eloy Detention Center on Saturday, July 19.

Ansari made a surprise visit in May, when she toured the facility and spoke with detainees about medical care access and other issues.

On a call Thursday, she told reporters she’d planned to visit people from her district this time, including a green card holder who’s been in the U.S. for 20 years and is battling leukemia.

“She’s lost 55 pounds since being at Eloy, and just today her friend shared that she was able to speak with her and said she’s in severe, severe pain from her cancer, and that she has not been treated for her pain, and is not getting any pain medication that she needs,” Ansari said.

Ansari said another person she’d planned to meet was a man who’s been unable to receive medical treatment in detention and has health issues that have become so severe that he’s agreed to be deported.

Ansari said her team reached out to ICE seven days in advance with requests to meet with detainees. She said she initially told she couldn’t meet with two people due to privacy release form issues and one case in which the person had been moved to a different detention center. The last remaining meeting was denied Friday afternoon.

“Again this was the night before, they came back, we received another email, stating ‘regarding your visit scheduled for tomorrow July 19, visits with detainees was not approved by the department,’” Ansari said.

Ansari said her staff asked ICE for more information, but her questions went unanswered.

In a redacted email correspondence between Ansari's office and ICE reviewed by KJZZ, an ICE respondent says two out of the three detainee visits are not cleared but a third is. A few hours later that Friday afternoon, another email says none of the visits are approved and asks whether Ansari will still be doing a site visit.

An email from Ansari’s staffer asks under what policy the requests were denied and proposes new visit times. ICE responds with an email address for the ICE Office of Congressional Relations.

ICE did not respond to questions about why detainee visits were denied or medical access issues.