更新于： 2026年2月10日 / 美国东部时间下午12:57 / CBS新闻
一名在美国生活近20年的爱尔兰男子被美国移民官员拘留近五个月，尽管他坚称自己拥有有效的美国工作许可，并且作为美国公民的配偶正在等待绿卡申请。谢默斯·卡leton（Seamus Culleton）表示，由于他被关押在德克萨斯州的拘留中心，那里的条件让他担心自己的生命安全。
根据美国移民和海关执法局（ICE）的被拘留者定位系统，居住在波士顿的卡leton被关押在德克萨斯州布利斯堡军事基地内的ICE拘留设施——埃尔帕索东部营地（El Paso Camp East Montana）。周一，卡leton在拘留中心接受爱尔兰国家广播公司RTÉ的电话采访时，将营地的生活描述为一场“噩梦”。
“你不知道每天会发生什么。你不知道是否会发生骚乱，你不知道会发生什么，”他告诉RTÉ。他将拘留设施描述为“一堆临时帐篷”。
（图片说明：爱尔兰籍男子谢默斯·卡leton于2024年8月在其Facebook账号上发布的照片。谢默斯·卡leton/Facebook）
卡leton称，自去年9月被捕以来，五个月内他几乎没有外出过。
“我几乎没有户外活动时间，没有新鲜空气，没有阳光。墙上有两台电视。这里总共有72名被拘留者。我们每天三餐，但分量非常非常小——像儿童餐一样，所以每个人都很饿，”他说。
卡leton称条件“肮脏不堪”，厕所和淋浴间“完全恶心”且“很少清洁”。
周二，隶属于美国国土安全部（DHS）的ICE否认了有关德克萨斯州该设施条件的指控。国土安全部公共事务助理部长特里西娅·麦克劳克林（Tricia McLaughlin）在一份声明中告诉CBS新闻，卡leton的说法“是虚假的”。“ICE的拘留标准比大多数关押美国公民的监狱要高。”
麦克劳克林证实，ICE特工于2025年9月9日逮捕了卡leton，称他是“来自爱尔兰的非法外国人”，2009年通过旅游签证豁免计划进入美国，但在允许停留的90天后未离开美国。
“他获得了充分的正当法律程序，并于2025年9月10日被移民法官下达了最终驱逐令，”麦克劳克林说。“他有机会立即被驱逐回爱尔兰，但他选择留在ICE拘留中心…… pending的绿卡申请和工作授权并不赋予某人合法居留美国的地位。”
根据美国法律，国土安全部可以逮捕那些有pending移民申请但没有永久居留身份的人，即使他们没有被定罪，但在之前的政府时期，没有犯罪记录且有有效pending申请的人很少被逮捕，官员通常会允许绿卡申请程序继续进行。
麦克劳克林表示，卡leton被提供了“立即被送往爱尔兰的机会”。她声称，他“选择留在ICE拘留中心，事实上，他采取了积极措施来继续留在拘留所中。”
卡leton称，他正在通过法律程序获得合法永久居留权（即绿卡），被捕时他拥有有效的美国工作许可。美国公民的配偶在绿卡申请处理期间可以获得工作许可。
作为一名泥瓦匠，卡leton称，他在9月初开车回家途中在一家商店停留时被联邦特工拦下。最初有一辆蓝色福特车跟随他，然后“突然出现了七八辆车和一群警察，他们围在货车窗口，让我摇下车窗。”
“他们问我是否有绿卡。我说没有。我说我嫁给了美国公民，已经提交了基于婚姻的移民申请，即将收到绿卡，并且我有工作许可可以在这里工作，”卡leton告诉RTÉ，补充说这些细节似乎都不重要，因为官员们继续拘留了他。
1月底的法庭记录显示，卡leton是在马萨诸塞州一家家得宝（Home Depot）外“当地警察对其车辆进行了牌照检查”后被拘留的。
爱尔兰政府大约一年前的估计显示，美国境内可能有多达1万名未登记的爱尔兰移民。许多人可能通过旅游豁免或临时工作签证入境，但在文件到期后非法滞留美国，实际上处于“隐形”状态。
爱尔兰外交部和贸易部发言人周二告诉CBS新闻，爱尔兰官员了解卡leton的案件，并正在为他和他的家人提供领事协助。
“我们驻华盛顿特区的大使馆也正在与国土安全部就此事进行高层直接沟通，”发言人表示。
去年12月，美国公民自由联盟（ACLU）和其他人权组织发布了一封公开信，要求关闭埃尔帕索东部营地（ERO El Paso Camp East Montana），指控该营地存在虐待模式，包括官员对被拘留移民的殴打和性虐待、殴打和胁迫性威胁以强迫驱逐至第三国、医疗疏忽、饥饿和食物不足、以及剥夺获得律师的有效途径等其他指控的权利侵犯。
卡米洛·蒙托亚-加尔维斯（Camilo Montoya-Galvez）对本报道有贡献。
Irish man Seamus Culleton held for months by ICE says he had U.S. work permit, and now fears for his life
Updated on: February 10, 2026 / 12:57 PM EST / CBS News
An Irish man who has lived in the U.S. for nearly 20 years has been detained by U.S. immigration officials for almost five months despite insisting he had a valid U.S. work permit and a pending green card case as the spouse of an American citizen. Seamus Culleton has said he fears for his life due to the conditions in the detention center where he’s being held in Texas.
Seamus Culleton, who lived in Boston, is being held at the El Paso Camp East Montana, an ICE detention facility inside the Fort Bliss Army base in Texas, according to the agency’s detainee locator system. Speaking to Irish state broadcaster RTÉ in a phone interview Monday from the detention center, Culleton described life at the camp as a “nightmare.”
“You don’t know what’s going to happen on a day-to-day basis. You don’t know if there’s going to be riots, you don’t know what’s going to happen,” he told RTÉ. He characterized the detention facilities as “a bunch of temporary tents.”
Irish national Seamus Culleton is seen in a photo posted on his Facebook account in August 2024. Seamus Culleton/Facebook
Culleton said he had rarely been outside in the five months since his arrest.
“I have barely any outside time, no fresh air, no sunshine. We have two TVs on the wall. There are 72 detainees here in total. We get three meals a day, very very small meals — kid size meals, so everybody is hungry,” he said.
Culleton called the conditions “filthy” and said the toilets and showers were “completely nasty” and “very rarely cleaned.”
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which ICE falls under, denied the allegations about the conditions at the Texas facility on Tuesday, with Assistant DHS Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin telling CBS News in a statement that Culleton’s claims were, “FALSE. ICE has higher detention standards than most U.S. prisons that hold actual U.S. citizens.”
McLaughlin confirmed that ICE agents arrested Culleton on Sept. 9, 2025, calling him “an illegal alien from Ireland” who entered the U.S. in 2009 under the tourist visa waiver program but then failed to depart the U.S. after the permitted 90 days.
“He received full due process and was issued a final order of removal by an immigration judge on September 10, 2025,” McLaughlin said. “He was offered the chance to instantly be removed to Ireland but chose to stay in ICE custody … A pending green card application and work authorization does not give someone legal status to be in our country.”
Under U.S. law, DHS can arrest people with pending immigration applications if they don’t have underlying permanent immigration status, even if they have not been convicted of crimes, but under previous administrations, non-criminals with valid pending applications were rarely arrested, and officials would typically allow a green card case to play out.
McLaughlin said Culleton was offered a chance to be sent to Ireland “instantly.” She claimed he “chose to stay in ICE custody, in fact he took affirmative steps to remain in detention.”
Culleton has said he was going through the legal process to obtain lawful permanent residency, or a green card, and that he had a valid U.S. work permit when he was arrested. Spouses of U.S. nationals can obtain a work permit while their green card applications are processed.
Culleton, a plasterer, said that he was stopped by federal agents while driving home in early September after stopping at a store. He was followed initially by a blue Ford, and then, “out of nowhere, it seemed like there were seven or eight cars and a bunch of officers at the window of the van, telling me to roll down the window.”
“They asked me if I had a green card. I said I didn’t. I said I was married to a citizen and that I had a marriage-based petition in place and I was just about to receive my green card and that I had a work permit to be here and work,” Culleton told RTÉ, adding that none of those details seemed to matter as the officers proceeded to detain him.
Culleton was held after “local police ran a license check on his vehicle outside a Home Depot in Massachusetts,” court records from late January show.
Estimates from the Irish government about a year ago suggested that as many as 10,000 undocumented Irish immigrants were living across the U.S. Many likely came on tourist waivers or temporary work visas but then stayed illegally in the country after those documents expired, effectively living in the shadows.
A spokesperson for the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade told CBS News on Tuesday that Irish officials were aware of Culleton’s case and were providing consular assistance to him and his family.
“Our Embassy in Washington D.C. is also engaging directly with the Department of Homeland Security at a senior level in relation to this case,” the spokesperson said.
In December, the American Civil Liberties Union and other human rights groups released a letter demanding the closure of ERO El Paso Camp East Montana, alleging a pattern of abuses at the camp including beatings and sexual abuse by officers against detained immigrants, beatings and coercive threats to compel deportation to third countries, medical neglect, hunger and insufficient food, and denial of meaningful access to counsel, among other alleged rights violations.
Camilo Montoya-Galvez contributed to this report.
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