ICE prisoners on hunger strikes Dozens of immigrants held in detention at both the Essex and Hudson county jails began a hunger strike on Monday Dectember 28, in an attempt to gain their freedom. The action coincides with a spike in Covid-19 cases at both facilities creating fear, a sense of urgency and exacerbating the already harsh conditions for those inside jails and ICE facilities. “I had never experienced the suffering, the pain, the agony that is to be locked up there, all the humiliations, all the torture that one goes through in that place. It’s unbelievable, it’s awful,” said one hunger striker, whose anonymity is being protected because he is in ICE detention at the Essex County Jail.