“Based upon my direct observations and experience working since 2005 as an attorney who primarily represents immigrants detained in Texas, I find the conditions at Pecos among the harshest and most restrictive of any ORR or ICE facility that I have visited in my career,” said Jonathan Ryan, president and CEO of immigrant-rights group RAICES…

[A]ccording to advocates with RAICES, children are being held for as long as 90 days in the Pecos facility, far longer than the 20-day limit on holding children in immigration detention—a key standard of care under the longstanding legal agreement that dictates how children in immigrant detention are to be treated by the U.S. government.

“The reports we have received from both attorneys and clients on the conditions at Pecos are the worst we’ve ever observed,” RAICES said in a statement that called on HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra to immediately shut down Pecos. “RAICES can’t in good conscience fail to blow the whistle.”