Hollywood Stars Demand Shutdown of Texas Detention Center Holding Migrant Children

More than 215,000 people -- including some of Hollywood's biggest names -- are demanding the federal government shut down a Texas detention facility where migrant children are being held in conditions they describe as inhumane and dangerous.

Jodie Foster, Spike Lee, Ben Stiller, Edward Norton, Janelle Monae, and Quinta Brunson are among the actors, artists, and activists who signed a letter calling for the "immediate closure" of the Dilley Immigration Processing Center, a prison-like facility operated by private contractor CoreCivic.

"Children held in immigration detention endure trauma, neglect and conditions that violate basic standards of health, safety, dignity and human rights," the letter states. "Children belong in schools and on playgrounds, not in detention centers."

The petition comes as the facility faces growing scrutiny over reports of abuse and neglect. Court filings detail a disturbing pattern: refusals to provide clean water, food contaminated with worms, dangerous medical neglect, sleep deprivation, denial of legal counsel, family separations, and retaliation against families who protest the conditions.

Recent reports cite cases of measles outbreaks, contaminated food and water, inadequate medical care, and what advocates call illegal imprisonment. The facility gained national attention after federal authorities sent 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos there following his arrest with his father during ICE raids in Minneapolis. Images of the child being taken into custody while wearing a Spider-Man backpack went viral and sparked outrage.

"As the outcry over ICE abuse and violence continues to grow, we must demand an end to family detention," said Carly Perez Fernandez, communications director at Detention Watch Network and member of the National Coalition to End Child and Family Detention. "Family detention, like all immigration detention, is inhumane and unjust."

The letter argues that childhood is a critical period that shapes lifelong well-being and must be protected -- not spent behind bars in facilities with documented health and safety violations.

The signatories include actors Jessica Alba, Tatiana Maslany, Alyssa Milano, and Jesse Williams, musicians Maren Morris, Lucy Dacus, and Joan Baez, athlete Megan Rapinoe, and activist Tarana Burke, among hundreds of thousands of others.

The petition demands not just the closure of Dilley, but systemic change and accountability for the treatment of children in immigration detention. It calls on both the federal government and CoreCivic, the private prison operator profiting from the facility, to end the practice of detaining families.

CoreCivic operates multiple immigration detention facilities across the country under contracts with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The company has faced repeated allegations of substandard conditions and civil rights violations at its facilities.

The Dilley center is one of the largest family detention facilities in the United States. It has been the subject of lawsuits and investigations for years, but conditions have reportedly worsened amid the Trump administration's expanded immigration enforcement operations.

Advocates argue that family detention serves no legitimate purpose and causes lasting harm to children. They point to alternatives like community-based case management programs that allow families to remain together while their immigration cases proceed -- at a fraction of the cost of detention and without the documented abuses.

The petition represents a growing movement demanding an end to the detention of children and families. As more details emerge about conditions inside facilities like Dilley, pressure is mounting on federal officials and private contractors to answer for their treatment of some of the most vulnerable people in the immigration system.