ICE Obtained Court Orders to Force-Feed 18 Hunger-Striking Detainees Across Four Federal Districts

Between January 2025 and August 2026, ICE obtained court orders authorizing forced medical treatment of 18 hunger-striking detainees across at least four federal districts, according to an investigation. Federal prosecutors and ICE officials secured these orders in emergency proceedings, several lasting under 24 hours, that gave detainees no opportunity to speak, no lawyer, and no advance warning before a judge ruled. At least three detainees were confirmed force-fed and two more probably were; five others broke their hunger strikes at the last minute specifically to avoid the procedure. The named case is Kurdish filmmaker Gabar Choli, force-fed for eight months via court order while striking against deportation to Iran — a federal judge authorized the procedure without ever allowing him to speak in court, and he was deported in January 2026. Rights groups classify force-feeding hunger strikers as a form of torture.

This is a distinct and more systemic finding than the hunger-strike actions already documented at Delaney Hall (2026-05-26–delaney-hall-newark-hunger-strike-geo-group-protests-pepper-ball-clashes-sen-andy-kim) — those covered strike conditions and the protest response outside the facility; this covers what ICE does to strikers directly, at a scale (18 individuals, four districts) that indicates an administration-wide practice rather than an isolated facility response. The ex parte court-order process — proceedings under 24 hours, no counsel, no hearing for the detainee — mirrors the accountability-elimination pattern this corpus tracks in other detention contexts: procedural speed engineered to prevent the affected person from contesting the action before it becomes irreversible.