Republican Senate candidate tours Burlington ICE facility

BURLINGTON — After taking a tour of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Burlington, Republican U.S. Senate candidate John Deaton defended the conditions inside and decried poor characterizations of the building by Democratic lawmakers who have taken tours of their own.

Deaton said he went on the tour to give himself “firsthand knowledge” of the conditions inside, and so that his general election opponent, Democratic incumbent U.S. Sen. Edward Markey, can’t argue on a debate stage that Deaton has not seen it for himself.

“I asked for some specific things to look at, for example I wanted to look for toothbrushes and toothpaste. As a father of daughters, one of the questions was ‘can you show me where the female hygiene products are?’ to make sure that’s adequate,” said Deaton to reporters and activists after his visit.

Deaton said ICE officials showed him those things, and said the overall conditions he saw inside were “better than your typical jail.”

The Burlington ICE facility became a point of focus for Democratic elected officials, activists and anti-ICE protesters after reports emerged in the spring of 2025 about allegedly poor conditions for the detainees inside. A number of Democratic lawmakers like U.S. Reps. Lori Trahan and Seth Moulton and Sens. Markey and Elizabeth Warren have visited the facility through a mix of prearranged and surprise inspections, each time leaving with a message about holding ICE accountable for the manner in which it conducts immigration enforcement and holds detainees.

In August after an unannounced visit, Moulton called the building “no place for human habitation.”

After his own visit, Deaton cast doubt on the characterizations of the facility given by the Democratic lawmakers.

“If you go to let’s say Burlington jail, and you’re stuck there overnight … There is going to be a cement bench, and there is going to be a bathroom area that is not completely private, and there are going to be no mattresses on the ground for you. You sleep on the cement bench,” said Deaton. “I am not here to tell you that it’s the conditions of a Comfort Inn or the Marriott or anything like that, but I am giving you an honest assessment that there are things in there that are better than if you are stuck over a weekend if you can’t make bail in a local jail.”

“Those are career politicians who are trying to score political cheap points,” said Deaton later, referring to the Democratic lawmakers who have conducted visits.

Deaton said he did not speak with any of the detainees inside, but that he saw four or five women detained in one cell, with men detained in another.

Despite his criticism of the Democrats, Deaton said he is “not hesitant to criticize Border Patrol,” claiming he was one of the first people to call for the resignation of former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem after the killings of U.S. citizens Alex Pretti and Renee Goode by immigration agents in Minnesota earlier this year.

DHS is the parent agency for ICE and Border Patrol.

“The thing that I’ve learned is that the state should be cooperating to catch the bad guys, not to do some of the stuff the Trump administration has pushed and other things,” said Deaton.

“When you don’t allow that, then that exasperates the situation because ICE is going to show up at Home Depot, or they’re going to show up at Walmart, and the people who are near them and their friends are going to get swept up in it who shouldn’t be swept up in it,” Deaton added later. “How about we just have some common sense, go back to the way (former President Barack) Obama had it and have the Secure Communities Act.”

Multiple activists present outside the facility told reporters that they had witnessed several detainee vans quickly pull into the facility property before Deaton’s arrival. Moulton made a similar claim during his unannounced August visit that his staff had seen multiple vans suddenly leave the property, while his entry into the building was delayed by 30 minutes.

Those claims were repeated to Deaton, who dismissed the idea that ICE had “cleaned up” the facility in preparation for his arrival.

“Two people were brought in while I was in there, two people who were put in the initial holding cell. One of the reasons we were delayed was that I had to wait until they were processed and be put in that holding cell,” said Deaton. “There were at least four to six or more women that were there overnight, so it’s not like they removed everyone … I’m not hesitant to criticize anyone, I just don’t know how you can cleanse something, it’s a holding cell. It has got a toilet that is metal. There is a cement bench there and there are mattresses on the floor there.”

Among the small group of activists standing outside the building during Deaton’s tour was Toni Matloff, who now stands outside the building five days a week to hand out basic supplies, toiletries, food, water and gift cards to detainees who are released from the building. Matloff started this effort last year during the crisis around Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program benefits.

While awaiting the end of Deaton’s tour, Matloff said some of the immigrant detainees she has spoken to at the facility have claimed to have been held there for weeks at a time.

“It is consistently busy in there. It has definitely ramped up in the last few weeks, and the Haitian community, right now I have a lot of people from Haiti really being targeted,” said Matloff. “Some of the stories we hear are truly, truly horrific.”

Matloff said before Deaton addressed reporters that she was “very curious” as to why Deaton felt the need to visit the facility.

“It’s a scheduled visit, so I’m very curious how they cleaned it up,” said Matloff.

After Deaton spoke, activist Jay Duchin said he “didn’t feel like there was any compassion” from Deaton.

“He tried to cushion or soften the conditions in there, and trying to relate to when he was in prison. We all hear it, it is not the same,” said Duchin.

“I feel they have known about him coming, so my feeling personally is that they prepped the area,” Duchin said later, noting that Deaton defended the quality of the mattresses available for detainees, but said nothing about blankets.

“Are they Mylar blankets? Or are they giving them something a little more substantial? He tried to deflect, as expected, towards Democrats … It’s just a lot of lip service. I sometimes say a lot of potatoes and no meat,” said Duchin.

In response to Deaton’s visit and claims by activists about how long immigrants are being detained in the Burlington facility, a DHS spokesperson reissued most of the same statement the agency had given after a discussion about the facility by the Burlington Select Board in August.

“This is a processing facility, not a detention facility. Illegal aliens are quickly processed and transferred to permanent housing at a detention facility. ICE is regularly audited and inspected by external agencies, and is committed to transparency,” the DHS spokesperson said. “The ICE Burlington facility has an abundance of supplies, including food, assorted snacks, water, personal hygiene, and bedding materials. Detainees have access to a shower. In fact, ICE has higher detention standards than most US prisons that hold actual US citizens. All detainees are provided with proper meals, medical treatment, and have opportunities to communicate with lawyers and their family members.”

After the ICE visit Deaton had scheduled campaign stops at Arati Adult Day Care in Lowell at noon, followed by a town hall session at UMass Lowell’s Coburn Hall in the evening.