U.S. Rep. Jason Crow was denied entry to a federal immigration detention facility in Aurora over the weekend in apparent violation of federal law, the congressman said.
Crow, a Democrat who represents Aurora, attempted to make an unannounced visit to the facility on Sunday. Doing so is allowed by a federal law that the congressman helped champion in 2019. But he was “denied access in violation of federal law,” Crow said in a video taken outside of the facility and posted on the social platform X.
Crow’s office has conducted regular inspections of the facility and posted reports about it on Crow’s website. But though members of Congress are legally allowed to make unannounced visits, their staff members must give 24 hours’ notice before they can tour a facility.
Crow told The Denver Post on Monday that he wanted to make sure that the conditions his staff sees on announced visits match the facility’s reality.
“When ICE has days to plan, things are cleaned up, dressed up — there’s a bit of a dog and pony show” that makes it harder to gauge the facility’s true condition, he said.
As Democratic lawmakers have increasingly shown up at detention centers to inspect their conditions, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement recently enacted its own policy requiring congressional members to give at least 72 hours’ notice before arriving at a facility.
Federal law does not require the type of notice that ICE has now sought to implement. Crow said he was “assessing legal options” in response to ICE’s refusal to allow him entry, though he declined to elaborate on what that meant. He said this was his first attempt to personally enter the facility since Trump returned to office.
Steve Kotecki, a spokesman for Denver’s ICE office, did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
The Aurora facility is a privately run detention center operated by the GEO Group and is capable of holding more than 1,500 people. As of late June, its average daily population was 1,159, according to a Syracuse University watchdog group.
Crow said he wanted to check that the facility still displayed public postings about access to legal counsel, and he wanted to see its medical units and food facility.
On Sunday, John Fabbricatore, a former ICE field office director — and Crow’s unsuccessful Republican challenger in last year’s election — responded to Crow’s X post: “You went there on a Sunday, knowing no one from ICE was there and that GEO was working with a weekend crew.” He called the attempted visit “100% performative.”
Crow declined to respond to Fabbricatore’s comments, other than to say that his former opponent was “wrong, repeatedly and habitually.”
Advocates and attorneys have long raised concerns about the conditions at the facility. The American Civil Liberties Union described the facility’s conditions as “atrocious” in 2019, after an Iranian man died there. In 2023, the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition released a report from detainees and their family members describing staff aggression and mistreatment.
Last month, a University of Utah student detained at the facility said she was served soggy bread and food and said she was treated better once the staff realized she spoke English.
Crow was repeatedly denied access to the facility in 2019, amid a disease outbreak. He later sponsored legislation allowing unannounced visits from members of Congress; the bill was passed as part of a broader spending bill, Crow’s office said in a statement.
His office now regularly publishes reports about the population and conditions within the facility. His office has also said that the Trump administration has stopped providing regular written updates about the facility to Crow.
Sunday was the first time he or his staff had been denied access to the facility since 2019, the congressman said.
According to records obtained by the ACLU, the GEO Group has proposed opening another ICE detention facility in Colorado Springs as the agency and the Trump administration seek to ramp up detentions and deportations.
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