On Wednesday, June 17th, Ranking Member Bennie G. Thompson (D-MS) and Committee on Homeland Security Democrats will hold a Democratic forum in Newark, New Jersey to conduct oversight of the Delaney Hall ICE detention center operated by GEO Group. At the forum, entitled “The Human Cost of Immigration Enforcement and Detention: Conditions and Oversight at Delaney Hall,” Members of Congress will hear from expert witnesses, local leaders, and a veteran detained by ICE on the conditions at the facility, the lack of oversight of the facility, and why it needs to be shut down.

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My name is Adam Marshall and I'm a veteran, a pacifist, and a member of the citizens movement known as Eyes on Ice.

From the period of March 25, 2025 to the date of my wrongful arrest and kidnapping by ICE, I had come to Delaney Hall three to four times per week to provide mutual aid to families, site safety and deescalation of our volunteers, and to pray alongside brothers and sisters from every faith, and to bear witness to the crimes that occur at Delaney Hall concentration camp, such as New Jersey Criminal Code 2C13-8 and the breach of the 4th, 5th, and 6th amendments of the Constitution.

The events that led to my kidnapping began with the detainee led hunger strike and labor strike on the 21st of May. At present, these are the demands of the women's unit:

1. Release all the women, priority given to those under 21, the sick, and the mothers.
2. Independently investigate the officer who has been sexually abusing the women.
3. Restore full visitation privileges.
4. Provide meaningful legal support.
5. Contract cleaning services and stop forcing the labor of the detained.
6. Provide qualified nurses and doctors. Stop giving incorrect medicines and denying access to prayer.
7. Replace the current food supplier to meet basic nutritional needs and accommodate both religious and medical diets.
8. Prepare the plumbing and HVAC to the second bathroom in the womans unit and all other bathrooms.
9. Provide safe drinking water.
10. Retrain geo group staff to ensure dignified lawful treatment of detained people.

Outside the facility the first four days of the strike were peaceful and without incident at approximately 1:00 a.m. on the 25th of May that changed when a convoy of 10 to 15 ICE vehicles arrived at the west gate to abscond with a detainee who had led the strike. Officers immediately applied force against protesters with batons and clouds of pepper spray. They shoved a woman in her 50s to the ground. The officers returned in daylight and repeated these tactics, pepper spraying Senator Andy Kim in the process. By this time, ICE had injured so many people that we had set up an aid station to care for those who were being bruised, cut, crushed, tackled, and mace.

Minor correction to the record, uh, in the army, I [trained in] combat life safety training, not medic training, but it's just a [layer]. So I played a role in evacuating casualties, varying supplies, and whatever I could uh by to preserve life and liberty. This was the full extent of my actions during the protest after ICE arrived. I did not carry protest signs and did not antagonize ICE agents and I wore red crosses on the front and rear of my jacket. I washed eyes, irrigated wounds, and led the injured to safe areas. On the 26th of May, I resumed this work.

At about 4 p.m. several people on the protest line warned me that ICE agents were referring to me as the target and were alleging that I was carrying knives and bear mace, none of which was true. I rendered aid to approximately a dozen people throughout the afternoon and before my kidnapping, a quadcopter drone flew above energy transfer facilities above uh rather south of Doremus avenue and about four to five ICE agents wearing gas masks emerged from the west gate. I was standing on the south side of Doremus avenue behind [an automotive], about six ICE agents rushed towards my location, tackled me with the ground and dragged me into the main courtyard with my arms behind my back. They were yelling, "Where is the bear mace? Who did you give the bear mace to?" I've never owned or used bear mace. I told them I was a veteran and I asserted my 1st amendment rights. I was pushed onto the roof of the blue SUV to be searched and my shoes and socks were removed. None of the other arrested individual barefoot. So, I presume this was humiliation tactic. My face was scanned into what I presume was a mobile fortify app.

In searching my belongings and finding my passport and UK citizenship documents, they told me I should run off to England, because I won't get arrested there. Several ICE agents who were also veterans approached me. The first was a shirtless white male, 20 to 30 years old, baby dirty blonde hair, who threatened violence against me, but was discouraged by his peers. A former marine with a large salt and pepper beard explained that he was, he was the one truly supporting and defending the constitution. An Air Force master sergeant showed me a phone picture of himself in uniform and he gloated, "I bet you thought ICE wouldn't arrest American citizens." Another veteran with reddish blonde hair eating a wheat snap bread from an MRE told me, "Hegseth is going to love you. You are cooked." I thanked all these gentlemen for their service. Two HSI personnel came forward to conduct an interrogation which I refused on the grounds of my 5th amendment rights.

Other officers removed the handcuffs from behind my back, tied a chain around my waist and attached the the handcuffs to the front of the chain. Claiming this was quote more comfortable. This setup resembles the shackles I have seen Delaney Hall detainees wear when they are transferred. I was moved to a vehicle with another arrested gentleman going by the name of Johnny. We were driven to a out of the facility into a deserted portion of industrial Newark, beneath an underpass in New Jersey turnpike. Our cuffs were removed and we were ordered to line up facing a metal wall with our hands above our heads. To me, this resembled an execution. After about 2 minutes, our seized belongings were thrown at our feet in evidence bags, and the agents claimed they were letting us off with a warning and to never return.

Based on all that I have witnessed, I wish to raise the highest level of alarm. New Jersey's human trafficking laws have been clouded by DHS agents. The constitutional protections against illegal search and seizure, the right to due process, and the right to a speedy trial simply do not apply at 451 Doremus Avenue. War hardened veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan are being employed by an agency that wants to expel our neighbors and intimidate those who speak out against them. I demand that members of this panel do all they can to fulfill the demands of the strikers and to dismantle ICE and DHS. I also ask for an independent investigation into the death of John Wilson [unintelligible]. I thank you for the opportunity to speak and I welcome your questions.

Nice mic. Wish he'd actually used it.