November 17, 2025

Durbin, Duckworth Help Introduce Bicameral Bill To Ensure DHS Detainees Can Speak To A Lawyer, Contact Their Families

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL), Ranking Member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) joined U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT) and U.S. Representative Maxine Dexter (D-OR-03) in introducing the Restoring Access to Detainees Act, a bill to ensure the Department of Homeland Security allows noncitizens who have been detained to contact their legal counsel and families. The bill comes after months of credible reporting that ICE and CBP have deprived detainees—including children and longtime legal residents—of the ability to access a lawyer. People have also reportedly been taken into custody and, in some cases, transferred to facilities in other countries without being allowed to contact their families.

“Federal immigration agents have been aggressively pulling people off the streets, racially profiling and cruelly detaining people without due process. For hours, and sometimes days, families cannot find their loved ones who have been detained,” said Durbin. “The Trump Administration is not going after ‘the worst of the worst.’ These federal agents are detaining children, U.S. citizens, and immigrants without criminal records and isolating them from their families while cutting off their ability to communicate. I’m joining my colleagues in introducing the Restoring Access to Detainees Act to ensure that individuals detained in immigration facilities can contact their families and attorneys.”

“People being detained by masked agents and denied their constitutional right to speak with their attorney—and even their families—is something that should never happen in the United States,” said Duckworth. “Families across the country are worried sick because they don’t know where their loved ones are. It’s not ‘the worst of the worst’ being targeted by Trump’s agents—it’s innocent children, U.S. citizens, hardworking neighbors with no criminal record and longtime legal residents who are being arrested and denied the opportunity to call anyone. Our legislation would put an end to this cruel, inhumane practice by the Trump Administration and ensure those who are detained can get in contact with legal counsel and their loved ones. It’s the bare minimum.”

The Restoring Access to Detainees Act would ensure:

  1. People detained, or transferred to a new facility, have the right to call their families to let them know where they are;
  2. People detained have an opportunity to speak confidentially with their legal counsel or to find competent legal counsel while in custody;
  3. People detained have an opportunity to communicate confidentially with existing oversight entities, if applicable; and
  4. The restoration of a program from the first Trump Administration which established a process for noncitizens to call their families while they are in deportation proceedings.

Notable instances of the Trump Administration cutting off detainees from legal counsel include:

  1. Mahmoud Khalil, a 30-year-old Columbia University graduate and U.S. permanent resident, was arrested without a warrant and transferred across three states — from New Jersey to New York to Louisiana — where he spent more than three months in a detention center.
  2. Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a 29-year-old from El Salvador living in Maryland, was arrested without a warrant and detained in Texas. Days later, he called his wife to tell her that he was being sent to El Salvador’s notorious Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT — which turned out to be the last time his family heard from him until his return to the US in June.
  3. Jackie Merlos, a 44-year-old mother with a U-deferred visa and her four U.S. citizen children, who were detained for weeks in a windowless cell without access to legal counsel and unable to contact family or friends.
  4. A 13-year-old child was arrested in Everett, MA, and transferred to a Virginia detention center. His family and lawyers were left in the dark for days about his location or the reason for his arrest.
  5. George Retes, a US citizen, was detained by ICE agents and held incommunicado, leaving him unable to contact his family — who only learned what happened to him after his release.
  6. Ramon Eduardo Contreras-Hernandez was denied access to legal representation after being transferred from an ICE detention center to a county jail, cutting him off from information about his own case.
  7. A ProPublica investigation found that more than 20 U.S. citizens have reported being detained for over a day without being able to call their loved ones or an attorney.
  8. Civil rights attorneys representing detainees in “Alligator Alcatraz” filed for a temporary restraining order against the detention center, citing systemic violations of detainees’ constitutional rights to legal representation and due process.

In addition to Durbin, Duckworth, and Murphy, the legislation is also cosponsored in the Senate by U.S. Senators Adam Schiff (D-CA), Alex Padilla (D-CA), Andy Kim (D-NJ), Angela Alsobrooks (D-MD), Ben Ray Luján (D-NM), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV), Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Cory Booker (D-NJ), Edward Markey (D-MA), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Jacky Rosen (D-NV), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Mazie Hirono (D-HI), Michael Bennet (D-CO), Patty Murray (D-WA), Peter Welch (D-VT), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), and Ron Wyden (D-OR).

In addition to Dexter in the House, the legislation is also cosponsored by U.S. Representatives Pramila Jayapal (D-WA-07), Suzanne Bonamici (D-OR-01), Judy Chu (D-CA-28), Salud Carbajal (D-CA-24), Chellie Pingree (D-ME-01), Dan Goldman (D-NY-10), Yassamin Ansari (D-AZ-03), Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC), Rick Larsen (D-WA-02), Ted Lieu (D-CA-36), Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-NJ-12), Dave Min (D-CA-47), Nellie Pou (D-NJ-09), Jill Tokuda (D-HI-02), Becca Balint (D-VT), Emily Randall (D-WA-06), Jesús “Chuy” García (D-IL-04), Mary Gay Scanlon (D-PA-05), Yvette D. Clarke (D-NY-09), Laura Friedman (D-CA-30), Frederica Wilson (D-FL-24), Julie Johnson (D-TX-32), Nikema Williams (D-GA-05), Robin Kelley (D-IL-02), Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-CA-37), Suhas Subramanyam (D-VA-10), Val Hoyle (D-OR-04), Andrea Salinas (D-OR-06), Jasmine Crockett (D-TX-30), Zoe Lofgren (D-CA-18), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI-12), Lizzie Fletcher (D-TX-07), Kelly Morrison (D-MN-03), Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL-25), Veronica Escobar (D-TX-16), and Derek Tran (D-CA-45).

The full text of the resolution can be found here.

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