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Four men held at the Folkston ICE Processing Center in Georgia appeared in a five-minute video that described conditions inside the facility and criticized the immigration court system. The video was reported by Gaby Del Valle in The Verge on October 8, 2026, and the outlet identifies the software involved as GettingOut, the facility’s communications platform owned by Telmate. The report does not establish how the recording left the facility. It says the exact method is unclear and raises only one possibility: that someone outside the facility received a call and recorded the message.

This article explains what the report says, what it attributes to whom, and where the evidence stops.

What the report says happened

According to The Verge, four detainees at Folkston, a facility in Charlton County, Georgia, appear in a five-minute video. In it they describe the conditions they live under and argue that the immigration court system is unfair. A detainee in the video characterizes the courts as “deportation courts.” That phrase is the detainee’s own description, not an official designation.

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The report is a single news account. It does not include the video’s original file, an official response from the facility, or independent inspection findings, so the claims below are reported allegations unless stated otherwise.

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The software and the devices behind it

GettingOut and Telmate

The Verge identifies GettingOut as the facility’s proprietary communications software, owned by Telmate. Detainees use it for messages, photos, phone calls, and video calls. Because the platform is built for contact with family and attorneys, the video illustrates a tension: a tool meant to keep people connected to loved ones was also used to carry a detainee’s account outside the building.

Tablet access in each housing pod

Atlanta immigration attorney Samantha Hamilton, of Asian Americans Advancing Justice, told The Verge that each pod holding 60 to 70 detainees has access to three or four tablets. This is Hamilton’s account of access, not a figure the report verified against facility records. Her quote about the limited options for communication is also attributed to her: “These facilities leave people with very few options to be able to communicate with their loved ones.”

How the video got out

The report is explicit that it cannot say how the men made the recording. The one scenario it offers is a possibility, not a finding: a person outside the facility may have received a call from the detainees and recorded the message. Other routes, including a tablet feature or a shared recording, are not addressed in the reporting, and readers should not assume any particular method.

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The distinction matters for the story. What is established is that the video exists and was reported. How it was made, and whether any facility rule was broken to make it, remain open.

Conditions and allegations described

Pay for detainee work

Detainee Idris Makhmudov, quoted by The Verge, said detainees working in Folkston’s work program are paid $1 a day, “which is just enough for a 10-minute phone call.” The report does not independently verify the pay practice. The figure reflects Makhmudov’s account of what workers receive.

Food and water

Hamilton, who is a member of the Shut Down Folkston campaign, told The Verge that coalition members regularly receive reports of poor food and water, including reports of worms in drinking water. These are attributed reports from the campaign and from Hamilton’s clients. The report does not present them as inspection findings, and no official response to them is quoted.

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Health problems

Hamilton also said her clients have reported health problems. The article does not link any specific illness to a specific facility condition, and no medical records are cited.

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Asylum and the case for detention

Makhmudov described most detainees as asylum seekers who fled political persecution and violence, and said that many feared becoming political prisoners in their home countries. He added that “one might say we became political prisoners in the United States simply because we are immigrants.” These are his personal views, quoted in the report.

The Verge also states that ICE detention is meant to ensure that people attend deportation proceedings, not to serve as punishment. That is the reporter’s framing of the system’s stated purpose. The detainees’ descriptions are a separate set of claims, and the article presents them side by side rather than reconciling them.

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Segregation, hunger strike, and retaliation claims

Hamilton told The Verge that the men shown in the video were placed in segregation, and she said her clients expected retaliation. The report attributes these statements to her. It does not describe any official disciplinary record.

The article also reports an open letter signed by 45 detainees and an estimated 73 detainees on hunger strike. These are dated estimates reported at the time of the article, not verified counts, and participation may change. Readers should check later reporting for current numbers.

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Folkston’s operator and contract figures

The Verge identifies GEO Group as the owner and operator of Folkston. The report gives a stated capacity of 780 beds and a guaranteed minimum occupancy of 544. It attributes operating payments of more than $1.5 million per month to a 2021 Homeland Security budget overview. That is a 2021 figure, and the report does not show whether the payment has changed since. The report also notes that Folkston was previously a prison.

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Georgia court figures

The Verge cites Georgia court data on representation and asylum decisions. The figures are attributed to federal data analyzed by Syracuse University researchers, and their scope is limited as follows.

Measure Figure as reported Scope and attribution
Detained Georgia court cases 143,729 over the preceding year Federal data analyzed by Syracuse University researchers, as reported by The Verge
Cases with no legal representation 81 percent Same dataset and attribution; applies to the detained Georgia cases counted above
Asylum cases decided in Atlanta 2,072 so far in the fiscal year the report covers As reported by The Verge; the report does not give the fiscal year’s end date
Asylum denial rate in Atlanta 89 percent, compared with 63 percent in 2023 As reported by The Verge; the comparison is between the current partial year and 2023

These figures describe the Georgia caseload in the cited data. They should not be applied to all immigration cases nationally, and the article does not reanalyze the underlying records.

Telmate and Tel*Link: company history

The Verge also reports past actions involving communications providers. It says Telmate was ordered to pay $4.23 million to settle a lawsuit stemming from a 2020 data breach. It says the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau ordered Tel*Link to pay $3 million over freezing and draining funds from incarcerated people’s accounts. The report also describes GettingOut’s terms, which address account inactivity and funds.

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These matters concern the companies’ histories, not the Folkston video. Check the primary court and regulatory records before relying on the amounts. Calling rates are another part of the cost picture: The Verge reports that FCC rate caps from 2024 set per-minute ceilings between 11 and 25 cents, depending on facility size, and that the FCC voted in 2025 to raise the cap by up to 83 percent.

What is and is not established

  • Established by the report: four men appeared in a five-minute video describing conditions and criticizing immigration courts, and the video was published by The Verge on October 8, 2026.
  • Established by the report: the software is GettingOut, owned by Telmate.
  • Not established: how the video was recorded and sent out.
  • Not established: whether the conditions described are accurate. The allegations come from detainees, their attorney, and campaign members.
  • Not established: whether any detainee was punished for the video. The report attributes the segregation account to Hamilton only.
  • Dated and changing: hunger-strike numbers, the 2021 contract payment, and the Georgia court counts.

For readers following the case, the next useful check is whether ICE, GEO Group, or the facility has responded on the record, and whether any independent inspection or court filing confirms the conditions described.

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