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Jan 11, 2026

Federal Judge Refuses To Block ICE Restrictions On Congressional Visits

A federal judge refused to block President Donald Trump’s administration from enforcing a new policy requiring members of Congress to give a week’s notice before visiting immigration detention facilities.

U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb in Washington, D.C., decided Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., said that she and other Minnesota lawmakers were kicked out of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in Minneapolis on Saturday, January 10. After being told about the Trump administration’s rule about visits from lawmakers, they were told to leave the facility.

Attorneys for several Democratic members of Congress asked Cobb to step in, but the judge said on Monday that they used the wrong “procedural vehicle” to do so. The judge also said that the January 8 policy is a new action by the Department of Homeland Security that is not covered by her previous order in favor of the plaintiffs.

“The Court emphasizes that it denies Plaintiffs’ motion only because it is not the proper avenue to challenge Defendants’ January 8, 2026, memorandum and the policy stated therein, rather than based on any kind of finding that the policy is lawful,” Cobb wrote.

Cobb put a stop to an administration oversight visit policy last month. On December 17, she said that ICE probably can’t ask members of Congress to give them a week’s notice before they visit and see how things are at ICE facilities.

The Associated Press says that U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem quietly signed a new memo the day after Renee Nicole Good died in Minneapolis. This memo reinstated a seven-day notice requirement.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs from the Democracy Forward legal advocacy group said that DHS didn’t tell them about the new policy until after Reps. Omar, Kelly Morrison, and Angie Craig were denied entry to an ICE facility located in the Minneapolis federal building.

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