Senator Warnock alerts of “serious concerns” around healthcare access, after visit to Stewart Detention Center

Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock is drawing attention to healthcare access for people being held at the Stewart Detention Center in Lumpkin, after a recent visit to the Immigration and Customs (ICE) facility. One particular group, pregnant women, may not be getting access to proper medical care.

“There are serious concerns in these facilities, particularly around the delivery of basic medical care,” said Warnock, who met with a pregnant woman among other detainees.  “When the federal government takes someone into custody, it takes responsibility for their safety and for their well being.” 

285 South requested an interview with the senator but his staff said he was unavailable. ICE did not respond to a request for comment from 285 South. 

Stewart is operated by CoreCivic, a private contractor. Officials from CoreCivic told the Senator that there are currently between five and nine pregnant women being held in the facility, Warnock’s office confirmed. A spokesperson for the private company did not respond to our question about how many pregnant women were detained at Stewart. 

An ICE directive states that the agency “should not detain, arrest, or take into custody for an administrative violation of the immigration laws individuals known to be pregnant, postpartum, or nursing unless release is prohibited by law or exceptional circumstances exist.”

CoreCivic spokesperson Ryan Gustin wrote in an email that the detention center currently does not have an on-site ob-gyn and that they are in the “final stages of backfilling this vacancy.” Right now, he wrote, “referrals are submitted to offsite OB/GYN providers, with appointment scheduling managed by those providers.”  He also said pregnant women in detention receive a specific diet, along with daily prenatal vitamins. 

A source who was present during Senator Warnock’s visit, but who was not authorized to speak on the record, said there appears to be the use of shackling among pregnant women during transportation. Per ICE guidance, notwithstanding certain exceptions, the use of restraints is prohibited for all pregnant women under the custody of ICE during transport, in a detention facility, and at an outside medical facility.  

The CoreCivic spokesperson denied pregnant women were being shackled.

“With respect to restraints, pregnant individuals are not restrained within the facility or during transportation for medical appointments,” said Gustin, citing the ICE policy. 

Amilcar Valencia, the executive director of El Refugio, a nonprofit that supports families visiting loved ones at Stewart, said that detainees often have to wait a long time to see a doctor and that, when they do, the attention they receive is limited. Through open records requests, the nonprofit has been tracking 911 calls coming out of Stewart, and this year, Amilcar said, the number of calls has gone up from the previous year. There were 272 emergency calls from the facility in the first six months of the year, he said, and 39 of them were related to abdominal or reproductive emergencies. 

Instances of the mistreatment of pregnant women in detention have been documented before. In 2025, the ACLU wrote a letter to Congress, ICE, and the Department of Homeland Security in 2025 where it detailed several cases, including at Stewart. Senator Jon Ossoff’s office published a report that same year, describing 14 cases where pregnant women were “not receiving adequate medical care and timely checkups, not receiving urgent care when needed, being denied snacks and adequate meals, and being forced to sleep on the floor due to overcrowding.”

Nationally, 498 pregnant, postpartum, and nursing women were marked as “booked out” of ICE custody between January 2025 and February 2026, according to the Department of Homeland Security. (“Booked out” may mean they were released; it may also mean they were deported or taken to a medical appointment.) There were 16 miscarriages in detention recorded between January and late September 2025.