José Chajón-Raxón, a Guatemalan immigrant detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) at Delaney Hall in Newark, New Jersey, died after being hospitalized following a medical emergency, according to the Trump administration. He is the third immigrant to die after being held at the facility, which reopened in May 2025 amid the administration’s immigration crackdown.
Medical Emergency and Death
According to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), a nurse responded when Chajón-Raxón experienced a medical emergency and “witnessed Chajón-Raxón experiencing seizure-like activity.” Medical personnel were called, and he was transported to a hospital. The DHS stated that ICE agents had arrested Chajón-Raxón and brought him to Delaney Hall on 18 July. He was “released from ICE custody on July 22,” according to the agency, which did not provide further details about the circumstances of his release.
The DHS account leaves key questions unanswered. The department did not say what happened after Chajón-Raxón arrived at the hospital, whether he left the hospital before his death, or exactly when he died. The DHS statement said: “Per ICE policy, when an individual is no longer in ICE custody then ICE will no longer be responsible for monitoring or reviewing deaths that may occur. This is common sense.”
Policy Shift and Criticism
This case follows a policy shift announced earlier this year, under which ICE stopped reporting deaths occurring within 30 days after a person is released from custody. That change reversed a policy put in place by the Biden administration in 2021. US Representative Rob Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat who has regularly visited Delaney Hall, sharply criticized the change. Menendez told the Associated Press that it creates a “loophole” allowing the agency to release someone from custody and then “claim it has no responsibility to investigate their death or inform Congress and the public.”
Chajón-Raxón’s death only became publicly known after Menendez disclosed it last week, following another death connected to the facility. Delaney Hall has already faced scrutiny from human rights advocates and Democrats over two other deaths involving immigrants detained there. Edwin López-Cornejo, a man from El Salvador, died earlier this month after a medical emergency while in ICE detention. Jean Wilson Brutus, a Haitian man who had also been detained at Delaney Hall, died in December.
Broader Concerns and Protests
The latest disclosure adds to broader concerns about deaths in immigration detention. More than 50 people have died in ICE custody nationwide since Donald Trump took office, while rights groups have repeatedly raised alarms about medical care and conditions inside detention facilities. Delaney Hall has increasingly drawn national attention. In recent months, protests have followed allegations of problems including physical abuse by guards and spoiled food. These concerns escalated in late May, when at least 300 detainees organized a hunger and labor strike. Weeks later, women housed in a separate unit at Delaney Hall launched a hunger strike of their own, demanding improvements and calling for ICE to release women younger than 21, women with medical conditions, and mothers. ICE maintains that detainees receive appropriate medical care.
