The Delaney Hall detention center in Newark has been a contentious focal point in President Trump’s immigration crackdown since its reopening last year, filling up with people taken into federal custody around the Northeast and attracting a steady stream of demonstrators.

The center first drew wide attention in May 2025, when Newark’s mayor, Ras Baraka, was charged with trespassing, and Representative LaMonica McIver, was charged with assault amid a protest and chaotic clash with immigration agents there. The case against Mr. Baraka was later dropped. The case against Ms. McIver is proceeding. Both are Democrats.

Last June, four men escaped from the 1,000-bed center through a flimsy wall during unrest that, immigration lawyers and detainees’ relatives said, was touched off by crowded conditions and a lack of regular meals. In December, a 41-year-old man from Haiti died soon after arriving at the center because of what federal officials called a medical emergency.

The latest conflict began during the Memorial Day weekend as protesters rallied in support of detainees reportedly staging a hunger strike over conditions at the center. It escalated on the holiday, after New Jersey’s governor, Mikie Sherrill, a Democrat, joined the protest.

Here’s how events at Delaney Hall have looked since then: