Migrant children detained at the border continue to sleep in cold cells without proper clothing or adequate food, a top Democratic lawmaker said on Thursday, accusing the Department of Homeland Security of blocking members of Congress from visiting the facilities.
Parents were not provided enough diapers for their children, toddlers were fed “burritos rather than age-appropriate foods” and one child was told by an immigration agent to eat food off the floor, according to interviews that House Democrats conducted with detainees during earlier visits.
In a letter sent on Thursday to Kevin K. McAleenan, the acting secretary of homeland security, the chairman of the House Oversight and Reform Committee, Representative Elijah E. Cummings of Maryland, said poor conditions at the facilities persisted, even after Congress approved a $4.6 billion border aid package in June. The money allowed the Border Patrol to quickly move children from facilities at the border and into better equipped shelters.
“One detainee alleged that a Border Patrol agent told a child who had spilled soup that the child would not receive more food unless the child drank the spilled soup off the floor,” Mr. Cummings said in the letter. “Detainees at Border Patrol facilities also told committee staff that they were pressured into signing documents in English without translation and denied access to telephones.”
Migrants also complained of spoiled food in Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities and inadequate access to medical care, Mr. Cummings said.
Even as Republican members of the oversight panel disputed those characterizations, the allegations renewed scrutiny over the treatment of migrant children in federal custody.
Earlier reports of poor conditions in overcrowded facilities prompted a number of hearings, including one last month in which Mr. Cummings accused Mr. McAleenan of leading an agency with an “empathy deficit”
Children were going unfed and unwashed, crammed into overcrowded cells with contagious diseases, those reports said, intensifying criticism of the Department of Homeland Security over whether it has acted quickly enough to support children in its care.
Mr. McAleenan has contended that he has for months sounded the alarm over a surge of migrant families at the southwestern border, which he said had pushed the agency’s resources beyond capacity. The immigration laws in the United States that prevent the quick deportation of Central American families have provided an incentive to those families, many escaping poverty and violence, to flee to the United States, Mr. McAleenan has said.
Under the border aid package, the Department of Health and Human Services, which manages shelters built for migrant children, received $3 billion.
Once that funding was provided, the number of children in facilities at the border declined to 200 in June from 2,700 in May, according to Customs and Border Protection officials.
After visiting facilities last week, Mr. Cummings said committee staff members planned to inspect 11 additional Customs and Border Protection facilities and five ICE facilities in Texas this week. While those members were en route, homeland security officials barred them from visiting, Mr. Cummings said.
He said the decision undercut an earlier commitment by Mr. McAleenan to welcome such visits by lawmakers.
Customs and Border Protection did not respond to requests for comment. A spokesman for ICE said the agency responded to letters from members of Congress only through official channels and referred questions to homeland security officials, who did not respond to requests for comment.
But in a letter sent to Mr. Cummings on Tuesday, Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio, the ranking Republican on the Oversight Committee, said the facilities were “well stocked and well tended.”
“No detainees expressed to us any mistreatment — although some complained the facilities’ air-conditioning was too cold,” Mr. Jordan said.
Mr. Jordan also accused the Democrats of mistreating Border Patrol agents.