Whipple on the outskirts of Minneapolis<\/a> 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.<\/p>\nJustice 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.<\/p>\n
But the judge found the evidence at this point in the lawsuit showed detainees face often insurmountable barriers to accessing attorneys. She cited evidence presented by The Advocates for Human Rights that showed detainees are moved to new locations quickly, frequently and without notice, leaving attorneys with no way to know where their clients are or how long they will be there.<\/p>\n
The transfers happen so quickly that sometimes DHS struggles to locate its detainees, the judge wrote, and the online system used to find detainees isn’t always updated accurately or in a timely manner.<\/p>\n
She also noted that detainees appear to be offered one phone call \u2014 which is done in earshot of ICE personnel, and is frequently used to contact families \u2014 and the list of free and low-cost legal service providers given to detainees isn’t always accurate.<\/p>\n
Federal agents have also rebuffed attorneys trying to reach their clients in person, she found, and detainees are often pressured to sign voluntary deportation agreements without being allowed to talk to counsel.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll of these barriers make it difficult \u2014 if not impossible \u2014 for attorneys to effectively represent their clients,\u201d the judge wrote.<\/p>\n
The order directs the government to ensure that every noncitizen taken into custody and held at Whipple be given the opportunity to contact an attorney within one hour of their detention and before they are transferred out of state.<\/p>\n
She also detailed how that access should be given \u2014 detainees must be given an accurate list of legal service providers, get free and private access to a telephone, and not be limited in the number of calls they can make to their lawyer.<\/p>\n
The judge also said that attorneys must be allowed to visit clients at the facility in a private room seven days a week, and that detainees cannot be transferred out of state for the first 72 hours of their detention.<\/p>\n
DHS must inform detainees where they will be transferred, and give them access to the telephone until they can reach an attorney or their family, the judge wrote.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe court has made clear that the Trump-Vance administration\u2019s overreaching and inhumane approach to immigration enforcement is unlawful and violates basic constitutional rights,\u201d Democracy Forward President Skye Perryman said. The organization is part of the plaintiffs\u2019 legal team. \u201cAccess to a lawyer is not optional; it is a fundamental right in America, and we will continue to fight to protect it.\u201d<\/p>\n
___ Boone reported from Boise, Idaho.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MINNEAPOLIS \u2014 A federal judge has ordered the Department of Homeland Security to give immigrants detained in Minnesota…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":155612,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[22212,477,1062,1841,116,118,117,4137,99,1431,1110,74846],"class_list":{"0":"post-155611","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jacksonville","8":"tag-constitutional-law","9":"tag-general-news","10":"tag-human-rights","11":"tag-immigration","12":"tag-jacksonville","13":"tag-jacksonville-headlines","14":"tag-jacksonville-news","15":"tag-lawsuits","16":"tag-politics","17":"tag-race-and-ethnicity","18":"tag-u-s-news","19":"tag-whipple-minnesota-detainees-attorneys-lawsuit"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155611","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=155611"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155611\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/155612"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=155611"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=155611"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=155611"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}