Detention and Deaths in Custody

Updated2026-11-09 Covers2025-01-16 to 2026-11-09

Summary

The administration sent migrants to Guantánamo Bay. It opened tent detention sites on an Army base and in the Florida Everglades. It also reopened detention for families.¹,²,³,⁴ In July 2025 Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) issued guidance about people who entered without inspection, meaning they crossed without being checked at a border post. It treated most of them as subject to mandatory detention with no bond hearing, where a judge could decide to release them while their case goes on.⁵ Congress set aside $45 billion for detention.⁶ Federal judges ruled against the no-bond policy more than 10,000 times by May 2026,⁷ and on Oct 1, 2026 the Supreme Court agreed to review it.⁷¹ Calendar 2025 had the most deaths in ICE detention since 2004.⁸ ICE counts deaths by fiscal year (FY), which starts each October. Its public list begins in FY2018. In fiscal 2026, the list shows a record 36 deaths. In fiscal 2025 it shows 24.⁹ Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) counted 52 from Jan 20, 2025 to June 4, 2026.⁶⁶ The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) closed its offices for civil-rights and detention complaints. It stopped reporting deaths that happen soon after release.¹⁰,¹¹ Its inspector general, an in-house watchdog, found people held past the 72-hour standard.⁶⁷ ProPublica counted 519 U.S. citizens detained, and about a dozen deported, through Oct 21, 2026.⁸⁴,²⁰⁶ ICE held 65,765 people in July 2026.¹³

Background

Immigration detention is civil, not criminal. It is not meant as punishment for a crime. For decades, some people were arrested inside the country after entering without inspection. They were treated as held under a part of the Immigration and Nationality Act⁴⁴ that lets officials choose whether to detain (INA §236(a), 8 U.S.C. §1226(a))⁴⁵. The Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) is the main federal immigration law. These people could ask an immigration judge for a bond hearing.⁵ ICE’s modern high for deaths in a year was 32, in 2004.⁸ The Homeland Security Act⁴⁶ is the law that created DHS. It also created oversight offices inside DHS. They included the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties (CRCL) and the Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman (OIDO). An ombudsman looks into complaints. These offices looked into complaints that included medical neglect and abuse in detention.¹⁰ The Biden administration had closed the family detention center at Dilley, Texas.⁴

What happened

Detention sites

On Feb 4, 2025 the first military flight carried 12 men to Guantánamo. It went under a Jan 29 memorandum, a written order, to expand the Guantánamo “Migrant Operations Center” to full capacity. Trump said it would hold up to 30,000.¹ By June about 500 had been sent. The tents put up in February were never used.¹ Sen. Gary Peters put the cost at about $100,000 per detainee per day. That compares with $165 in detention inside the U.S.¹⁵ A Senate report counted ~852 men sent through October 2026 at a cost of over $100 million. On an August 2026 visit, it found 445 staff and zero detainees.¹⁶ In late August 2026 ICE flew a group of Somali men there. Eight were still there in mid-September.¹⁷

In early March 2025 ICE hired CoreCivic to reopen Dilley. CoreCivic expected about $180 million in yearly revenue from it. By January 2026 Dilley held hundreds of children.⁴

Trump toured “Alligator Alcatraz,” a tent camp run by Florida in the Everglades, on July 1, 2025.³ On Aug 21, 2025 a federal judge ordered it wound down. The judge found the defendants had not done the environmental review that the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA)⁴⁷ requires.¹⁹⁸ NEPA is a law that makes federal agencies study a project’s effects on the environment first. The 11th Circuit, a federal appeals court, paused the order.¹⁹ Florida confirmed Alligator Alcatraz would close (June 25, 2026).³¹ On Sept 14, 2026 the DHS inspector general reported on 79 of its detainees. They had been held in small metal cages: 16-square-foot outdoor and 18-square-foot indoor enclosures. The inspector general said these were not aligned “with standards for humane treatment.”³²

On Aug 1, 2025 the Army began paying to run Camp East Montana at Fort Bliss. The first detainees arrived in mid-August.² Its ~$1.26 billion Army contract first went to a contractor that had no past experience running detention, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), Congress’s auditing office. It became the nation’s largest detention site.² DHS also gave names to detention sites in state prisons. One was “Speedway Slammer,” and another was “Cornhusker Clink,” at Nebraska’s McCook Work Ethic Camp, which Gov. Jim Pillen announced on Aug 19. On Sept 3 DHS announced “Louisiana Lockup” at Angola. DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said Angola was chosen “absolutely” for its reputation.¹⁸,¹²²

Under its “Detention Reengineering Initiative,” ICE bought 11 commercial warehouses. One was in Williamsport, Md. (Jan 16, 2026, $102.4 million, for about 1,500 people). WYPR reports that it has only four toilets.⁴¹,¹²⁸ Maryland and Social Circle, Ga., sued over the purchases.⁴¹ In Maryland v. Mullin⁶², Judge Brendan Hurson granted a temporary restraining order (TRO) (Mar 11). A TRO is a short-term order that stops something while a judge looks at the case. He then granted a preliminary injunction (Apr 15), which stops something until the case is decided. He found DHS had likely misused categorical exclusions for “minor renovations.” These exclusions let agencies skip a full environmental review for small projects. Judge Eumi Lee (N.D. Cal.) blocked a Gilroy site on Sept 11.⁴¹,¹²⁷,¹²⁸,¹³⁰ ICE paused purchases after Markwayne Mullin replaced Noem as DHS Secretary. On May 29 NBC News reported that DHS and ICE had picked several of the warehouses as candidates for sale. None was yet on the market, and no final decision had been made.⁴¹,¹²⁹

Funding and the no-bond policy

On July 4, 2025 the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA)⁴⁸, a spending law, gave ICE about $75 billion over four years. It included $45 billion for detention, enough for 100,000+ beds. It also included $29.9 billion for enforcement, including 10,000 new officers.⁶ On July 8 ICE issued interim guidance. It said that anyone who entered without inspection, including long-term residents, is an “applicant for admission.” That label makes a person subject to mandatory detention with no bond hearing.⁵ The Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA), the Justice Department’s top immigration court, adopted this reading in Matter of Yajure Hurtado⁴⁹ on Sept 5, 2025.⁵

Federal appeals courts split over the policy in 2026. On Feb 6 a Fifth Circuit panel upheld it 2–1 in Buenrostro-Mendez v. Bondi. Judge Edith Jones wrote that “the text says what it says, regardless of the decisions of prior administrations,” and Judge Dana Douglas disagreed. In her dissent, Douglas wrote that the 1996 Congress “would be surprised to learn it had also required the detention without bond of two million people.”⁸³ On Mar 25 an Eighth Circuit panel also upheld it 2–1 in Herrera Avila v. Bondi. Judges Shepherd and Grasz formed the majority, and Judge Erickson dissented. The ruling reversed a Minnesota judge’s habeas ruling. Habeas corpus is a court’s power to order the government to justify holding someone.⁸³ On Apr 28 the Second Circuit became the first appeals court to reject the policy. A unanimous panel ruled for Ricardo Aparecido Barbosa da Cunha. Judge Joseph Bianco, a Trump appointee, wrote the opinion, joined by Judges José Cabranes and Alison Nathan. Barbosa da Cunha is a Brazilian who entered around 2005, applied for asylum in 2016, and has no criminal record. He owns a home in Massachusetts. He was arrested on an administrative warrant in September 2025.⁸³ The panel held that people arrested inside the country after entering without inspection are held under 8 U.S.C. §1226(a), which allows a bond hearing. It said the government’s reading “defies their plain text.” It warned of “serious constitutional questions” raised by “the broadest mass-detention-without-bond mandate in our Nation’s history for millions of noncitizens.”⁸³ DHS responded that “ICE has the law and the facts on its side and will be vindicated by higher courts.”⁸³ By the fall nine circuits had rejected the policy and two had upheld it, according to the National Immigration Forum. The Supreme Court then took the Second Circuit case for review (see Why it matters).⁸³,⁷¹

About 40,000 people were in detention at the inauguration. The number peaked at 70,766 on ICE’s public count (Jan 24, 2026), or about 73,000 in internal data.²⁵ DHS’s funding later ran out because Congress had not passed its yearly funding. During that 75-day funding lapse (Feb 14–Apr 30, 2026), ICE kept operating on OBBBA money.²⁹,¹³¹

Conditions of confinement

On Aug 12, 2025 Judge Lewis Kaplan (S.D.N.Y.) issued a temporary restraining order over ICE’s hold rooms at 26 Federal Plaza in Manhattan. Some detainees were held there “far longer than the 72-hour norm,” a lawyer for the plaintiffs said. On Sept 17 Kaplan issued a preliminary injunction. It required hygiene items, bedding, more access to lawyers and a notice of rights. (Access to medicine had been part of the TRO.)⁴⁰,¹²⁰,¹²¹ In May 2026 he held a bench trial, meaning a trial before a judge with no jury. His final judgment of Sept 24, 2026 found “overcrowded, squalid, and degrading” cells at 26 Federal Plaza. Detainees there were denied treatment for tuberculosis and mpox. He found the conditions were imposed to push people to deport themselves. He held that limits on access to lawyers violated the First and Fifth Amendments⁶¹,⁵³. The First Amendment protects speech and the right to ask the government for help. The Fifth Amendment says no one may lose liberty without due process, meaning fair legal steps. He set enforceable standards for space, sleep, food, medical care and legal calls. They cover a class, meaning everyone held there.⁴⁰

On Mar 20, 2026 Judge Jerry Blackwell (D. Minn.) ordered DHS to allow in-person pastoral visits to everyone held at Minneapolis’s Whipple Building. A Lutheran bishop had been turned away there on Ash Wednesday. Blackwell found the Lutheran, United Church of Christ and Jesuit plaintiffs likely to win under the First Amendment and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA). ICE said Whipple is a short-term holding site, not a detention center where visits are normal.⁷⁹ On May 22, 2026, detainees at Newark’s Delaney Hall, run by GEO, began a month-long hunger and labor strike over conditions. ICE denies the strike took place. Protests outside led to 90+ arrests. The American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey (ACLU-NJ) said agents fired pepper balls and tear gas on May 25, and DHS accused protesters of blocking officers.⁶⁹ ProPublica lists about 11 U.S. citizens arrested by federal agents at the Delaney Hall protests from May 26 to Jun 5, among them a woman charged with punching an agent.¹¹⁴

The DHS inspector general published reports from May 28 to Oct 26, 2026 that found problems at several sites. Krome, in Miami, was 25% over capacity, with 1,102 detainees for 882 places. Intake holds there ran over 12 hours (Sept 11, from a May 2025 inspection). Winn Correctional, La., failed standards on food, medical care, use of force and legal access (June 2). At Cibola, N.M., four of five use-of-force incidents reviewed broke the rules (Sept 28). At El Paso’s hardened facility, holds averaged 108 hours, against a 72-hour standard. Of 15,975 bookings, 44% went over it (Oct 26, from a July 2025 inspection).⁶⁷,¹³²,¹³⁴,¹³⁵,¹³⁷ It found gaps in ICE’s electronic health records system. The system “does not fully address its capability needs for transferring and accessing medical records,” risking “untimely and inaccurate healthcare decisions resulting in patient harm,” the inspector general said. It also found that about $10 billion in FY2020–23 contracts for detention space were poorly planned and monitored. ICE denied the inspector general read-only access to three contracting and financial systems. DHS’s chief procurement officer denied it back-end access to its contract system.⁶⁷,¹³³,¹³⁶ Its open reviews include system-wide factors in detainee deaths, and ICE’s warehouse purchases.⁶⁷

Deaths in custody

Deaths rose as the number of detainees rose. On Aug 5, 2025 Chaofeng Ge, 32, died at Moshannon Valley, Pa., five days after ICE took him into custody. TIME obtained his autopsy. It lists suicide. It also records restraints on his hands, feet and chest that were applied before death. ICE’s death report does not mention them.⁶³ On Sept 24 a sniper fired on ICE’s Dallas field office. He hit three detainees in a van, and two of them died. No officers were hurt. The FBI called it “targeted violence,” and no official motive has been released.⁶⁴ By late December 2025, counts put calendar 2025’s custody deaths at 30–32 (sources differ). There were seven deaths in December. That tied with September for the most in a month in HRW and PHR’s table.⁸

On Jan 3, 2026 Geraldo Lunas Campos died at Camp East Montana. DHS said he attempted suicide. The El Paso County medical examiner ruled the death a homicide, a medical finding that others caused the death. The examiner found “asphyxia due to neck and torso compression” during restraint.²³ At least three detainees died there in six weeks. Francisco Gaspar-Andres, 48, died on Dec 3, 2025, and his ICE death report cites cirrhosis and cardiac hypertrophy. Lunas Campos was the second. Victor Manuel Diaz, 36, died on Jan 14, 2026, and ICE’s report describes him as found unresponsive. That report says he was found “with ligature around his neck,” and HRW and PHR count his death as an apparent suicide. His family disputes that, according to the National Immigration Project (NIPNLG).²³,¹³⁸,¹³⁹ Parady La, 46, of Philadelphia, died Jan 9, three days after his arrest. ICE said he was found “distressed and stuporous” at FDC Philadelphia. It has not said what care he received earlier.⁶⁵ A blind Rohingya refugee was found dead after DHS released him at a coffee shop about 5 miles from home. DHS did not tell his family or lawyer (Feb 25, 2026). Afghan asylum seeker Mohammad Nazeer Paktiawal, 41, died at Parkland Hospital in Dallas on Mar 14, a day after his arrest. He had fallen ill in a hold room at ICE’s Dallas field office. More than a week later, the medical examiner still listed the manner of death as pending. ICE’s death report states no cause. It describes chest pain and tongue swelling treated with epinephrine.²⁴,⁷²,¹⁴⁰ By March, FY2026’s first six months had more deaths (26) than all of FY2025 (24 on ICE’s death-reporting page).²²

On June 25, 2026 HRW and PHR reported 52 deaths from Jan 20, 2025 to June 4, 2026, nearly four times the Biden-era rate. Over the same time, the number of detainees grew about 77%. They counted seven apparent suicides in the first year, against one in 2024, and found about 64% of ICE’s 48-hour death notices were filed late. They said ICE’s disclosures were too thin to say whether any death was preventable.⁶⁶ DHS told TIME there had been “NO spike in deaths.”⁶⁶ When fiscal 2026 closed (Sept 30), ICE listed 36 deaths, 12 more than FY2025’s 24. Todd Lyons, acting ICE director until May 31, 2026, had blamed the rising toll on “the highest amount in detention that ICE has ever had.”⁹,⁸² On Oct 17 Emiliano Andrade-Covarrubias, 56, was found dead at the Rio Grande Processing Center in Laredo, run by GEO. He was a lawful permanent resident, meaning a green-card holder. His daughter said staff withheld his heart, diabetes and blood-pressure medicines. On Nov 8 ICE’s page still listed no FY2027 deaths.⁶⁸ On Nov 9 the news agency EFE reported on ICE’s own internal reviews of detainee deaths, which the San Francisco Chronicle obtained. ICE investigators found poor medical care in at least 23 of 29 deaths from January 2025 to January 2026. They called the problems a factor leading up to the deaths. In at least eight cases, medical staff did not do CPR properly or did not do it at all.²¹⁰

Oversight offices and public reporting

On Mar 21, 2025 Secretary Kristi Noem closed CRCL, OIDO and the CIS Ombudsman. That froze ~600 open investigations. DHS said the offices “obstructed immigration enforcement.”¹⁰ On May 7, 2026 DHS said OIDO was winding down. It blamed the funding lapse (“Congress did”), though the law ending the lapse did not require it. On June 4 ICE stopped reporting deaths that happen within 30 days of release.³⁰,¹¹,¹¹⁸,¹¹⁹ DHS’s statistics office has issued none of its monthly tables on arrests, detentions and removals since Jan 16, 2025, and it has given no public explanation.⁷⁰

On Sept 18, 2025 DHS arrested 11 New York state legislators. It also arrested city officials, including NYC Comptroller Brad Lander. They were demanding access to inspect the ICE hold rooms at 26 Federal Plaza. Lander had been arrested at the building once before, on Jun 17. (For the court’s later findings on the hold rooms, see Conditions of confinement above.)¹⁰⁹ On Dec 15, 2025 Judge Jia Cobb (D.D.C.) paused a DHS rule. It required members of Congress to give seven days’ notice before visiting ICE facilities. House Democrats led by Rep. Joe Neguse had sued under §527 of the DHS appropriations act⁵⁰. That section bars DHS from using its funds to block members’ oversight visits.⁴² Noem then put the rule back in place by memo (Jan 8, 2026). Cobb issued a TRO (Feb 2) and a stay under §705 of the Administrative Procedure Act⁵¹ (Mar 2). The Administrative Procedure Act sets the rules agencies must follow. That section lets a court pause an agency action while a case goes on. On May 8 the D.C. Circuit, a federal appeals court, refused to pause Cobb’s ruling during the appeal. Judge Rao wrote that the government is “very likely to succeed” on standing, the question of whether the members had the right to sue. But she said it had not shown irreparable harm, meaning harm that could not be fixed later.⁴²,¹²³,¹²⁴,¹²⁵,¹²⁶

Release orders and contempt findings

On Dec 11, 2025 Judge Paula Xinis ordered Kilmar Abrego Garcia released. She found he was held without a valid removal order. She also found that government lawyers had “misled” the court.²⁰ Judge Fred Biery ordered the release of 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos, who had been flown to Dilley on Jan 20, 2026. His order criticized the government’s “pursuit of daily deportation quotas.”²¹

Courts also found that ICE had not obeyed release and arrest orders. On Feb 18, 2026 Judge Laura Provinzino (D. Minn.) held Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Isihara in civil contempt at $500 a day. Civil contempt is a penalty for disobeying a court order. Isihara is an Army lawyer on loan to the Justice Department (DOJ). He is listed on more than 100 habeas cases. ICE had released Rigoberto Soto Jimenez in Texas without his identity documents. But she had ordered him released in Minnesota with his property. She wrote that “the government’s understaffing and high caseload is a problem of its own making”⁷⁸. She said on Feb 20, after the property was returned, that no fine would be imposed.²⁰⁷ On Oct 26, 2026 Magistrate Judge J. Maureen Kelly (W.D. Pa.) held three officials in civil contempt. They were Attorney General Todd Blanche, Secretary Mullin and ICE Philadelphia field-office director John Rife. They had arrested Nain Vasquez Gonzalez despite a release order. She called the arrest “unauthorized and unlawful.”⁴³ A Minnesota judge ordered Milton Saltos Velasquez released “immediately.” ICE had re-arrested him before he left the Whipple Federal Building, and the judge warned of sanctions (Oct 19).²⁰⁸ On Nov 2 Judge Mustafa Kasubhai (D. Or.) found ICE had violated his February order on arrests without warrants. He also found that a deportation officer lied in an arrest report.²⁰⁹ On Nov 3 Judge S. Kato Crews (D. Colo.) ordered the release of Edgardo Garcia Vargas, whom ICE had re-arrested minutes after freeing him under an earlier court order. Crews wrote: “Once again, the cruelty appears to be the point.” He barred another arrest without a bond hearing.²¹¹ On Nov 9 a government lawyer told Judge John Tunheim (D. Minn.) that ICE’s latest re-arrest of a man Tunheim had twice ordered freed was “a new arrest.” Tunheim is weighing civil contempt.²¹² The same day Nathan Rasper, acting head of ICE’s Denver office, told Judge Charlotte Sweeney (D. Colo.) that he had ordered officers to re-arrest people freed by judges’ orders. He said he had since stopped. Sweeney called one such re-arrest “a due process violation.”²¹³

Detention of U.S. citizens

ProPublica counted more than 170 U.S. citizens held by immigration agents by Oct 16, 2025. The government keeps no count.¹² ProPublica’s database, published Oct 6, 2026 and updated Oct 29, lists 519 citizens detained by federal agents between January 2025 and Oct 21, 2026.²⁰⁶ By ProPublica’s account, more than 100 were held after agents questioned their citizenship, “nearly all … people of color.” At least 70 were children and teens, and about 20 of them were handcuffed or zip-tied. In all, 36 were held at least a day without contact with a lawyer or family. At least 63 were detained while recording agents. And “roughly a dozen,” mostly children, were deported.⁸⁴ More than 300 were accused of assaulting or obstructing agents, about 130 of them at protests. Of those, 137 were charged in federal court. In nearly half of those cases, the charges were dropped or dismissed.⁸⁴ ProPublica calls the list an undercount. It includes only people it could identify. It leaves out detentions at airports and the border, arrests on judicial warrants, and protest arrests by local police.⁸⁴ DHS told Senate investigators that ICE does not arrest U.S. citizens. It said its arrests rest on “reasonable suspicion.”¹⁰⁸ Detentions of citizens during the Los Angeles, Chicago, Portland, Charlotte and Minneapolis operations are described in City Enforcement Operations and Fatal Shootings.

Some citizens, most of them children, left the country with a parent who was removed. A 10-year-old citizen was recovering from brain surgery. She and three of her citizen siblings were detained with their undocumented parents after a stop at a Border Patrol checkpoint in South Texas on Feb 3, 2025. They were removed to Mexico on Feb 4, the family’s lawyer said. The mother said officers “weren’t interested” in the letters from doctors and lawyers that the family carried. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) called reports of the case “inaccurate.”⁸⁶ On Apr 25, 2025 three U.S.-citizen children were removed to Honduras with their mothers. One was a 4-year-old with stage-4 cancer. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the children were “not deported,” their mothers were.²⁶ On Jul 31 the two families sued in J.L.V. v. Acuna. They say ICE detained the mothers at check-ins where they had been told to bring the children’s passports. They say ICE held them in hotel rooms without access to lawyers or relatives. They also say ICE removed one family in under a day and the other in just over two, even though court filings were pending.⁸⁹ Chanthila Souvannarath claims citizenship through his father, who became a citizen. He had been held at Angola since June 18, 2025, and he was removed to Laos about Oct 24, after a court order barring his removal. Chief Judge Shelly Dick (M.D. La.) had issued that temporary restraining order on Oct 23. DHS said the order “was not served” on ICE until after the removal. DHS also said he had been ordered removed in 2006 after assault and firearm convictions.¹⁰⁰ Five-year-old Génesis Ester Gutiérrez Castellanos is a citizen from Austin. She was removed to Honduras with her mother on Jan 11, 2026, after the two were held for “nearly a week” in a hotel about 80 miles from home. They had no lawyer and no hearing.²⁷,¹⁰² On Mar 9 ICE put two 12-year-old citizen twins from Orlando on a removal flight to Guatemala with their mother. ICE had detained her at a check-in. Lawyers got an emergency hearing, and the girls were returned the same day. ICE told the judge it was a “misunderstanding” under its “family unity” policy.¹⁰³ ProPublica studied ICE arrest records through mid-August 2025, and found that ICE had detained parents of at least 11,000 U.S.-citizen children in the term’s first seven months. That is about twice the Biden-era rate. About 60% of those arrests ended in removal, against about 30% under Biden. ICE renamed its Parental Interests Directive the “Detained Parents Directive.” DHS said it “cannot verify the veracity of the data” and that “ICE does not separate families.”⁸¹

Adult citizens were also removed or held for days. Brian Morales García is a 25-year-old citizen born in Denver. He was stopped for window tint near Fredericksburg, Texas, on Apr 3, 2026, and moved through five facilities¹⁰⁴ before he was removed to Mexico on Apr 7. He says officers would not let him get his birth certificate. He says he signed a removal admission because he feared prison. DHS said agents “did NOT arrest a U.S. citizen,” citing record checks, his admission and a Mexican ID with a different spelling and birth date.²⁰⁴ CBP let him back in at Laredo on his birth certificate on Aug 30. This was under a joint filing in his suit, Morales Garcia v. Mullin (W.D. Tex.), which continues.¹⁰⁵ There were earlier holds too. A Dexter Township, Mich., man was handcuffed outside a courthouse near Plymouth, and ICE admitted it mistook him for its target.⁸⁵ An Oklahoma City mother and three daughters were held while agents searched for the home’s former tenants.²⁰⁰ An Omaha man was kept in a county jail two nights past his release date at ICE’s request (April to June 2025).²⁰¹ Border Patrol held Jose Hermosillo, a 19-year-old citizen from Albuquerque, for 10 days in April 2025. He had gone up to an agent in Tucson for help. DHS released a transcript signed “JOSE” in which he is recorded as saying he was a Mexican citizen. He says he cannot read and was told to “sign everything.”⁸⁷ In Florida a Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) detainer, a request to keep someone in jail, held Georgia-born Juan Carlos Lopez-Gomez, 20, in jail. This happened after a state judge found his birth certificate real (Apr 16–18, 2025).⁸⁸ CBP held Portland mother Kenia Merlos and her four citizen children for about two weeks after a June 28, 2025 stop at the Peace Arch border park. The children were 9-year-old triplets and a 7-year-old. They were released to family friends in mid-July. An immigration judge ended her removal case on Oct 14,⁹⁴ and she was freed on Oct 27.⁹³,²⁰³ Army veteran George Retes, a U.S. citizen, was held three days without charges, a phone call or a lawyer after the July 10, 2025 Camarillo raid. He sued on Feb 19, 2026.²⁸,⁷³ ICE held Dulce Consuelo Díaz Morales, a 22-year-old Maryland mother, for 25 days (Dec 14, 2025 to Jan 7, 2026). She had a Maryland birth certificate, but ICE said she “is NOT a U.S. citizen.” She was later issued a passport, and DHS then asked to drop her removal case. DHS still says she claimed Mexican citizenship at the border in 2023.¹⁰¹ Citizen children were held in operations aimed at their parents. A 4-year-old was kept for weeks in hotel rooms with her Honduran mother in New York, from Dec 20, 2025 until a habeas petition succeeded.²⁰² In Donna, Texas, a family’s suit says agents pointed guns at two siblings in their home on Jan 9, 2026. They were Humberto and L.G., a disabled minor the agents forced to kneel.⁹² On May 20, 2026 a Colorado-born citizen was stopped at a Lafayette Parish sheriff’s 287(g) checkpoint. Under such deals, local police do some immigration work. She was accused of carrying a forged ID, shackled and booked into ICE’s Basile facility. She was released about 18 hours after the stop, once her lawyer emailed her documents. The sheriff’s office still says the ID was fake.¹⁰⁶ Later detentions include a Bronx 19-year-old tackled by agents on May 6. His grandmother says he was released far from home with an apology. DHS said he matched a target’s description.¹⁰⁷ An Evanston man was held for fingerprinting on Sept 20. Local police are looking into his injuries.²⁰⁵

Worksite raids led to the first court limit aimed at detentions of citizens. Leonardo Garcia Venegas is an Alabama construction worker and a citizen with a REAL ID. Agents tackled him while he filmed a May 21, 2025 raid in Foley. It was the first of three times he was detained in worksite raids. DHS said he was getting in officers’ way. ProPublica found no federal charge.⁹⁰ ICE and HSI agents tackled and arrested two citizen sisters filming a Brownsville, Texas, raid on Jul 23, 2025 and held them for hours at the Harlingen ICE office. On Apr 24, 2026 the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF) filed claims seeking $2.5 million each for the three siblings. The claims were filed with the agency under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA). That law lets people seek money from the U.S. for some wrongs by federal workers.⁹⁵,⁹⁶ ProPublica counts two citizens among about 475 workers detained in the Sept 4, 2025 raid on the Hyundai–LG battery plant in Ellabell, Ga. It counts five more in a raid on a food plant in Cato, N.Y., the same day. On Sept 10, 2026 the Cato workers filed Rojas v. McCoy (N.D.N.Y.). It is a class action under the Fourth Amendment, which bars unreasonable searches and seizures.⁹⁹,⁹⁷,⁹⁸ On Sept 21, 2026 Judge Jeffrey Beaverstock (S.D. Ala.) paused three DHS worksite practices in several southern Alabama counties in Garcia Venegas v. Homan. One is entering private worksites without a warrant. Another is holding people without a specific reason to suspect each one. The third is keeping workers held after they show proof of citizenship. The government had argued that the policies do not exist. It also argued that construction sites are “open fields” where no warrant is needed, and that REAL IDs are not reliable proof of citizenship.⁹¹

Congressional Democrats and the DHS inspector general have tried to get a count. On Dec 9, 2025 Democrats on the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (PSI) released a staff report. The report, “Unchecked Authority,” covers nearly two dozen citizens detained from June to November 2025, and five of them testified, Retes among them.¹⁰⁸ On Feb 5, 2026 the inspector general listed an ongoing review of “Processes that DHS Law Enforcement Personnel Follow to Prevent the Arrest of U.S. Citizens During Immigration Enforcement Operations.” No report had been found as of November 2026.¹¹⁰ On Apr 20 House Oversight Democrats sent the inspector general 677 incidents from their enforcement dashboard as individual complaints. Of those, 189 involved citizens. No response has been found.¹¹¹ On Oct 15 Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández introduced H.R. 10826, which would pay at least $500,000 plus $100,000 a day to citizens detained since Jan 20, 2025 without a warrant or probable cause. Probable cause means a good reason to believe someone broke the law. It would also bar immunity defenses. DHS called claims that citizens are arrested and deported “FALSE.”¹¹² On Oct 21 four House Democrats asked Secretary Mullin how many citizens DHS has detained. They also asked which documents are enough to prove citizenship. They cited Noem’s Oct 30, 2025 statement that no citizens had been arrested or detained. They cited acting ICE Director Todd Lyons’s Feb 10, 2026 testimony that “no American citizen falls under Title 8,” the part of federal law on immigration. They cited Border Patrol official Jason Schneider’s Jun 30, 2026 testimony that a citizen “can simply say ‘I’m a U.S. citizen,’” and a 2021 GAO finding. That finding said ICE did not know how often it took enforcement action against possible citizens. No response has been found.¹¹³

Key dates

• 2025-02-04 — Guantánamo migrant flights begin — → ledger
• 2025-03-21 — DHS shuts its civil-rights and detention watchdogs — → ledger
• 2025-04-25 — U.S.-citizen children deported to Honduras — → ledger
• 2025-07-04 — OBBBA detention and enforcement funding — → ledger
• 2025-07-08 — ICE mandatory-detention guidance; Sykes class judgment; certiorari granted Oct 1, 2026 — → ledger
• 2025-08-01 — Army begins paying for Camp East Montana at Fort Bliss; first detainees arrive mid-August — → ledger
• 2025-08-21 — Alligator Alcatraz wind-down order — → ledger
• 2025-12 (late) — 2025 deadliest year in ICE detention since 2004 — → ledger
• 2026-01-03 — Lunas Campos death ruled homicide — → ledger
• 2026-01 (mid) — Record detention population — → ledger
• 2026-01-16 — ICE buys Williamsport warehouse, one of 11 it bought — → ledger
• 2026-03-05 — Noem fired — → ledger
• 2026-04-28 — Second Circuit rejects no-bond policy, splitting with the Fifth and Eighth Circuits — → ledger
• 2026-06-04 — ICE stops reporting post-release deaths — → ledger
• 2026-06-25 — HRW/PHR report: 52 deaths, Jan 2025 to June 2026 — → ledger
• 2026-09-21 — Garcia Venegas v. Homan stays Alabama worksite practices — → ledger
• 2026-09-24 — Kaplan final judgment on 26 Federal Plaza hold rooms — → ledger
• 2026-09-30 — FY2026 ends with 36 deaths — → ledger
• 2026-10-06 — ProPublica publishes database of more than 500 citizens detained — → ledger
• 2026-10-26 — Kelly holds Blanche, Mullin and Rife in civil contempt over a release order — → ledger
• 2026-10-29 — ProPublica update: 519 citizens — → ledger
• 2026-11-09 — ICE’s internal reviews find poor medical care in at least 23 of 29 deaths — → ledger

Why it matters

Immigration and Nationality Act §235(b)(2)(A) and §236(a) (8 U.S.C. §§1225(b)(2)(A), 1226(a)). The legal question is which part of the INA covers people arrested inside the country after entering without inspection. One choice is INA §235(b)(2)(A) (8 U.S.C. §1225(b)(2)(A))⁵², which requires holding an “applicant for admission,” with no bond. The other is INA §236(a) (8 U.S.C. §1226(a)), which allows release on bond. Detainees have also raised due-process claims under the Fifth Amendment. They raise these claims through habeas petitions, which ask a court to make the government justify holding someone (28 U.S.C. §2241⁵⁴). The administration’s position is in ICE’s July 8, 2025 guidance and the BIA’s Matter of Yajure Hurtado (Sept 5, 2025). It says such people are applicants for admission and must be held.⁵ By May 2026, 425+ federal judges had ruled against that reading more than 10,000 times. That was about 90% of habeas petitions decided.⁷ In Maldonado Bautista v. Santacruz, Judge Sunshine Sykes (C.D. Cal.) held the guidance unlawful. She certified a nationwide class of people eligible for bond, and entered judgment cancelling the guidance (Nov 20–Dec 18, 2025). On Feb 18, 2026 she found the government had violated her order by still holding class members under Yajure Hurtado. On Mar 31 the 9th Circuit paused nationwide relief outside C.D. Cal. and put the BIA decision back in effect.¹⁴,⁷¹ The Fifth Circuit (Feb 6, 2026) and the Eighth Circuit (Mar 25) upheld the government’s reading by 2–1 votes. The Second Circuit (Apr 28) rejected it unanimously. It said the reading goes against the statutes’ “plain text” and raises “serious constitutional questions.” The split turns on whether a long-term resident arrested inside the country is “seeking admission” under §1225(b)(2)(A).⁸³ Nine of 11 circuits had rejected the policy, and the 5th and 8th had upheld it. Then on Oct 1, 2026 the Supreme Court agreed to hear Rhoney v. Barbosa da Cunha⁷⁴. That is the Second Circuit’s Apr 28 case, brought for a Brazilian man arrested in September 2025 and never charged with a crime. Argument is expected in 2027.⁷¹

Suspension Clause (Art. I §9 cl. 2). Habeas corpus is protected by the Suspension Clause⁵⁵. That part of the Constitution bars suspending habeas except in a rebellion or invasion. Boumediene v. Bush (2008)⁵⁶ held that this right reaches detainees at Guantánamo. On Feb 12, 2025 the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and legal-services groups sued for access to lawyers. They said the government had provided “virtually no information” about the detainees. A June 2025 court filing by the government described the site as “staging for final removal.”¹⁹⁷ The record here does not include the administration’s stated legal basis for the limits on access.

Homeland Security Act (6 U.S.C. §345) and Inspector General Act (5 U.S.C. §406(a)). Congress created CRCL (6 U.S.C. §345)⁵⁷ and OIDO by law. The legal question is whether the Secretary may close offices that a law creates and funds. Advocacy groups sued over the closures. At a May 19, 2025 hearing, Judge Ana Reyes said she was concerned about being “hoodwinked” by DHS promises to restaff. The record here includes no ruling on the merits, meaning a final decision on the main question.¹⁰,³⁰,¹¹⁷ The record names no law that required ICE’s Biden-era practice of reporting deaths within 30 days of release.¹¹ The Inspector General Act (5 U.S.C. §406(a))⁷⁶ gives an inspector general the right to “timely access to all records” of the agency it oversees. ICE denied the DHS inspector general read-only access to three contracting and financial systems. DHS’s chief procurement officer denied it back-end access to its contract system.⁶⁷

Fifth Amendment Due Process Clause (conditions of confinement). Immigration detention is civil. So claims about conditions arise under the Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause. Under Bell v. Wolfish (1979)⁵⁸, conditions of detention that is not meant as punishment may not amount to punishment. Youngberg v. Romeo (1982)⁷⁵ was a Fourteenth Amendment case about people a state confined for care, not crime. It held that people held under civil law keep protected rights to reasonably safe conditions and to freedom from unreasonable bodily restraint. Courts judge this by whether professional judgment was used. HRW and PHR’s doctors reported a “high suspicion” of inadequate or delayed care in several deaths. Ge’s autopsy records restraints applied before death.⁶⁶,⁶³ GAO (June 2026) and a February 2026 ICE inspection found Camp East Montana opened without meeting detention standards. An ACLU class action, Akari Angye v. ICE (W.D. Tex.)⁵⁹, asked in October 2026 for a preliminary injunction on conditions. That request is pending.³³,³⁹ Alligator Alcatraz’s outdoor enclosures measured 16 sq ft. ICE’s standard is at least 37 sq ft for a single cell. DHS says it is not responsible for the site’s day-to-day operations.³²

National Environmental Policy Act (42 U.S.C. §4321 et seq.). The Alligator Alcatraz challenge turned on whether it was a federal project. The district court treated it as one,¹⁹⁸ and the 11th Circuit treated it as a state project.¹⁹ The warehouse suits ask whether DHS may use categorical exclusions for “minor renovations” when turning a warehouse into a detention site. The record here does not include DHS’s stated legal basis.⁴¹

Religious Freedom Restoration Act (42 U.S.C. §2000bb-1). RFRA⁸⁰ bars the government from placing a heavy burden on religious practice. The only exception is when the government shows a compelling interest, pursued in the least restrictive way. Blackwell held that limits on clergy access to detainees cause “irreparable harm,” meaning harm that cannot be fixed later. He also rejected an argument that the case was moot, meaning no longer live. He did so because DHS had no formal policy on who sets the conditions of access.⁷⁹

Fourth and Fifth Amendments (detention of citizens). The INA’s power to detain and remove people applies to noncitizens. Holding a U.S. citizen raises questions under the Fourth Amendment (seizure)⁶⁰ and the Fifth Amendment (due process). Judge Terry Doughty (W.D. La.) said in April 2025 he had a “strong suspicion that the Government just deported a U.S. citizen with no meaningful process.” Rubio’s position was that the children’s mothers, not the children, were deported.²⁶ Retes sued under the Federal Tort Claims Act (28 U.S.C. §1346(b))⁷⁷, which waives federal immunity for certain wrongful acts of federal employees. He says agents broke his car window, filled the car with tear gas and pepper spray, and held him 72 hours. DHS said he became violent and was arrested for assault. He was never charged.⁷³ In Noem v. Vasquez Perdomo (Sept 8, 2025)¹¹⁵, the Supreme Court paused an order against roving-patrol stops. Justice Kavanaugh agreed and wrote separately. He wrote that if officers learn the person stopped “is a U. S. citizen or otherwise lawfully in the United States, they promptly let the individual go.” Justice Sotomayor disagreed. “That blinks reality,” she answered, noting two citizen plaintiffs. She wrote that the concurrence “shifts the burden onto an entire class of citizens to carry enough documentation to prove that they deserve to walk freely.”¹¹⁵ Judge Beaverstock relied partly on that concurrence in Garcia Venegas v. Homan. He did so because that detention was neither brief nor ended when citizenship was shown. He held that a policy of entering worksites without a warrant “is likely to run afoul of the Fourth Amendment.” The government’s position is that construction sites are “open fields.”⁹¹ In the removals of citizen children, the disputed question is whether a parent’s choice to take the children along was informed and voluntary. The government says it was, and the families dispute it.⁸⁶,⁸⁹ Claims for money against the United States must first go to the agency. A suit may follow a written denial, or six months without a decision (28 U.S.C. §2675(a)¹¹⁶). The Brownsville siblings’ claims are at that stage.⁹⁶ The parental-interests directive is internal ICE guidance, not a regulation. So ICE could change it without notice and public comment. It also creates no rights that citizen children can enforce in court.⁸¹ See Federal Data Sharing and Surveillance, Alien Enemies Act and CECOT, City Enforcement Operations and Fatal Shootings, Shutdowns, Rescissions and Impoundment Findings, Inspectors General and Watchdogs, Conflicts Between the Executive and the Courts and Domestic Troop Deployments (military bases used for civil detention).

Outcome

Where things stand

ICE’s death-reporting page lists 21 people who died from Jan 20, 2025 to the end of fiscal 2025 (Sept 30): - Genry Ruiz Guillen (Krome Service Processing Center, Miami, Jan 23)¹⁴¹ - Serawit Gezahegn Dejene (Eloy Detention Center, Ariz., Jan 29)¹⁴² - Maksym Chernyak (Krome, Feb 20)¹⁴³ - Juan Alexis Tineo Martinez (Homeland Security Investigations custody in San Juan, P.R., two days after a sea interdiction, Feb 23)¹⁴⁴ - Brayan Rayo-Garzon (Phelps County Jail, Rolla, Mo., Apr 8)¹⁴⁵ - Nhon Ngoc Nguyen (El Paso Service Processing Center, Tex., Apr 16)¹⁴⁶ - Marie Ange Blaise (Broward Transitional Center, Pompano Beach, Fla., Apr 25)¹⁴⁷ - Abelardo Avelleneda-Delgado (in contract transport from Lowndes County Jail, Valdosta, Ga., to Stewart Detention Center, May 5)¹⁴⁸ - Jesus Molina-Veya (Stewart Detention Center, Lumpkin, Ga., June 7)¹⁴⁹ - Johnny Noviello (Federal Detention Center Miami, June 23)¹⁵⁰ - Isidro Perez (Krome, June 26)¹⁵¹ - Tien Xuan Phan (Karnes County Immigration Processing Center, Tex., July 19)¹⁵² - Chaofeng Ge (Moshannon Valley, Pa., Aug 5)⁶³ - Lorenzo Antonio Batrez Vargas (Central Arizona Florence Correctional Complex, Aug 31)¹⁵³ - Oscar Duarte Rascon (Eloy, Sept 8)¹⁵⁴ - Silverio Villegas González (shot by an ICE officer during an arrest in Franklin Park, Ill., Sept 12)¹⁵⁵ - Santos Banegas Reyes (Nassau County Correctional Center, East Meadow, N.Y., Sept 18)¹⁵⁶ - Ismael Ayala Uribe (Adelanto ICE Processing Center, Calif., Sept 22)¹⁵⁷ - Norlan Guzman Fuentes (shot in the sniper attack on ICE’s Dallas field office, Sept 24)⁶⁴ - Huabing Xie (Imperial Regional Detention Facility, Calexico, Calif., Sept 29)¹⁵⁸ - Miguel Angel Garcia Hernandez (shot in the same Dallas attack, died Sept 30)⁶⁴

For fiscal 2026 the page lists 36: - Leo Cruz-Silva (Ste. Genevieve County Jail, Mo., Oct 4)¹⁵⁹ - Hasan Ali Moh’d Saleh (Krome, Oct 11)¹⁶⁰ - Josué Castro Rivera (struck and killed on I-264 in Norfolk, Va., while fleeing an ICE vehicle stop, Oct 23)¹⁶¹ - Gabriel Garcia-Aviles (Adelanto, Oct 23)¹⁶² - Kai Yin Wong (South Texas ICE Processing Center, Pearsall, Oct 25)¹⁶³ - Francisco Gaspar-Andres (Camp East Montana, Fort Bliss, Dec 3)¹³⁸ - Pete Sumalo Montejo (Montgomery Processing Center, Conroe, Tex., Dec 5)¹⁶⁴ - Shiraz Fateh Ali Sachiwani (Prairieland Detention Center, Alvarado, Tex., Dec 6)¹⁶⁵ - Jean Wilson Brutus (Delaney Hall, Newark, N.J., Dec 12)¹⁶⁶ - Fouad Saeed Abdulkadir (Moshannon Valley, Dec 14)¹⁶⁷ - Delvin Francisco Rodriguez (Adams County Correctional Center, Natchez, Miss., Dec 14)¹⁶⁸ - Nenko Stanev Gantchev (North Lake Correctional Facility, Baldwin, Mich., Dec 15)¹⁶⁹ - Geraldo Lunas Campos (Camp East Montana, Jan 3, 2026)²³ - Luis Nunez Caceres (Joe Corley Processing Center, Conroe, Tex., Jan 5)¹⁷⁰ - Luis Yanez Cruz (Imperial Regional, Jan 6)¹⁷¹ - Parady La (FDC Philadelphia, Jan 9)⁶⁵ - Victor Manuel Diaz (Camp East Montana, Jan 14)¹³⁹ - Heber Sanchez Dominguez (Robert A. Deyton Detention Facility, Lovejoy, Ga., Jan 14)¹⁷² - Lorth Sim (Miami Correctional Center, Bunker Hill, Ind., Feb 16)¹⁷³ - Jairo Garcia Hernandez (assigned to Krome and held at Larkin Community Hospital Behavioral Health, Feb 16)¹⁷⁴ - Alberto Gutierrez Reyes (Adelanto, Feb 27)¹⁷⁵ - Pejman Karshenas Najafabadi (Louisiana ICE Processing Center, Angola, Mar 1)¹⁷⁶ - Emmanuel Damas (Central Arizona Florence Correctional Center, Mar 2)¹⁷⁷ - Mohammad Nazeer Paktiawal (Parkland Hospital, Dallas, after falling ill in a hold room at ICE’s Dallas field office, Mar 14)¹⁴⁰ - Royer Perez Jimenez (Glades County Detention Center, Moore Haven, Fla., Mar 16)¹⁷⁸ - Jose Guadalupe Ramos Solano (Adelanto, Mar 25)¹⁷⁹ - Tuan Van Bui (Miami Correctional Center, Apr 1)¹⁸⁰ - Alejandro Cabrera Clemente (Winn Correctional Center, Winnfield, La., Apr 11)¹⁸¹ - Aled Carbonell Betancourt (Federal Detention Center Miami, Apr 12)¹⁸² - Denny Adan Gonzalez (Stewart, Apr 28)¹⁸³ - Mamuka Artmeladze (Winn, June 4)¹⁸⁴ - Felix Alcorta-Rodriguez (Webb County Detention Center, Laredo, Tex., June 19)¹⁸⁵ - Adrian Florian (Port Isabel Service Processing Center, Los Fresnos, Tex., June 24)¹⁸⁶ - Jesus Manuel Arenas Silva (during a bus transfer from Irwin County Detention Center, Ocilla, Ga., July 13)¹⁸⁷ - Edwin Lopez Cornejo (Delaney Hall, Aug 1)¹⁸⁸ - Lianyong Wei (CNMI Department of Corrections, Saipan, Aug 23)¹⁸⁹

ICE announced two more fiscal 2026 deaths by news release without posting them on the page: - Carlos Josue Marchena-Marchena (Winn, Sept 18)¹⁹⁰ - Julian Curo-Churata (after being held at Richwood Correctional Center, Monroe, La., Sept 29)¹⁹¹

Two people died shortly after ICE released them. They are outside its count, because ICE ended post-release death reporting in June 2026: - Jose Chajon-Raxon (after a medical emergency at Delaney Hall, which DHS says had released him, July 22)¹⁹² - Prisciliano Trejo Ricano (nine days after ICE released him from Stewart while he was in a coma, July 24)¹⁹³

For fiscal 2027 the page has no section as of Nov 8, 2026, and ICE has announced four deaths by news release: - Emiliano Andrade-Covarrubias (Rio Grande Processing Center, Laredo, Oct 17)⁶⁸ - Luis Sandoval (Folkston D. Ray ICE Processing Center, Folkston, Ga., Oct 23)¹⁹⁴ - Roberto Jimenez Gutierrez (Otay Mesa Detention Center, San Diego, Oct 24)¹⁹⁵ - Fran Gregory Portillo-Zapata (North Central Baptist Hospital, San Antonio, hospitalized since Sept 30 while detained at Karnes County, Oct 29)¹⁹⁶ The ledger carries each death as its own dated entry. Two pattern entries sum up the FY2025 and FY2026–27 counts (→ ledger, → ledger). A roster of each death, built from ICE’s own death reports, is at Deaths in ICE Custody Roster. For each death it gives the cause narrative, days in custody, how late ICE gave notice, and ledger status.

As of November 2026, ICE held 65,765 people (Jul 11, 2026, the latest public count). The peak was 70,766 on ICE’s public count (Jan 24, 2026), or ~73,000 in internal data. ICE said in January 2026 it had hired 12,000+ officers.¹³,²⁵,³⁴ Its death page listed no FY2027 deaths as of Nov 8, 2026, even though Andrade-Covarrubias died on Oct 17. The record shows no prosecution or discipline for any custody death.⁹,⁶⁸ ICE’s own internal reviews found poor medical care in at least 23 of 29 deaths from January 2025 to January 2026, EFE reported.²¹⁰ No-bond detention remains in force in most of the country until the Supreme Court decides the circuit split. Camp East Montana remains open.¹⁴,⁷¹,³⁹ Abrego Garcia is free, and the Justice Department seeks to remove him to Liberia.³⁶ Judges in Colorado and Minnesota are weighing contempt over ICE re-arresting people right after courts ordered them freed. The acting head of ICE’s Denver office testified on Nov 9 that he had ordered such re-arrests and has since stopped.²¹²,²¹³ OIDO is winding down. Noem was fired Mar 5, 2026.³⁰,³⁷,¹¹⁸ ProPublica counts 519 U.S. citizens detained through Oct 21, 2026, about a dozen of them deported. DHS has published no count. It had not answered House Democrats’ Oct 21 request for one. The inspector general’s review of citizen arrests had produced no report.²⁰⁶,⁸⁴,¹¹³,¹¹⁰ A stay in Garcia Venegas v. Homan bars three worksite practices in southern Alabama. Morales García’s suit continues after his Aug 30 return. The J.L.V. and Rojas suits are pending.⁹¹,¹⁰⁵,⁸⁹,⁹⁸

Status

Gaps remain. There is no ruling yet on Camp East Montana conditions, and no Supreme Court decision on no-bond detention. There are no detention counts after July 2026, because DHS’s monthly enforcement tables have been suspended since January 2025. ICE has posted no FY2027 death listings, and there is no official count of U.S. citizens detained.⁷⁰,¹¹³

Who is affected

Detention policy reaches noncitizens arrested inside the country, including long-term residents. ICE’s July 2025 guidance treats them as subject to detention without a bond hearing. It reaches people held in sites where courts, GAO and the DHS inspector general found conditions below standards. It also reaches the families of people who died in custody.⁵,⁷,⁴⁰,³³,⁶⁷,⁹ It reaches U.S. citizens held by ICE, and U.S.-citizen children whose parents were detained. It reaches people whose complaints were pending before the DHS oversight offices that were closed. And it reaches federal and Florida taxpayers who fund the detention sites.¹²,⁸¹,¹⁰,⁶,³⁵

• People in ICE detention (One Big Beautiful Bill Act detention funding, In force) — the number of detainees rose from roughly 40,000 at the inauguration to a peak of 70,766 on ICE’s public count on Jan 24, 2026, about 73,000 in internal data. It was 65,765 on July 11, 2026, after the July 4, 2025 law gave ICE $45 billion for detention.²⁵,¹³,⁶
• Noncitizens arrested inside the country (no-bond detention, Pending) — by May 2026 more than 425 federal judges had ruled against the no-bond reading more than 10,000 times, about 90% of habeas petitions decided. Judge Dana Douglas, dissenting in the Fifth Circuit, wrote that the 1996 Congress “would be surprised to learn it had also required the detention without bond of two million people.”⁷,⁸³
• People who died in custody (custody deaths, Pending) — ICE listed 24 deaths in fiscal 2025 and 36 in fiscal 2026. Human Rights Watch and Physicians for Human Rights counted 52 from Jan 20, 2025 to June 4, 2026, nearly four times the Biden-era rate. Meanwhile the number of detainees grew about 77%. DHS told TIME there had been “NO spike in deaths.”⁹,⁶⁶ ICE’s own internal reviews found poor medical care in at least 23 of 29 deaths from January 2025 to January 2026, EFE reported.²¹⁰
• Camp East Montana detainees (Camp East Montana, In force) — at least three detainees died there between Dec 3, 2025 and Jan 14, 2026. DHS said Geraldo Lunas Campos attempted suicide, and the El Paso County medical examiner ruled his Jan 3 death a homicide. GAO (June 2026) found the site opened without meeting detention standards.²³,³³,¹³⁸,¹³⁹
• Guantánamo detainees (Guantánamo, In force) — a Senate report counted about 852 men sent through October 2026 at a cost over $100 million. Eight Somali men were still there in mid-September 2026. Sen. Gary Peters put the cost at about $100,000 per detainee per day, against $165 in detention inside the U.S.¹⁶,¹⁷,¹⁵
• Alligator Alcatraz detainees (Alligator Alcatraz, Concluded) — the DHS inspector general reported on Sept 14, 2026 that 79 detainees had been held in small metal cages of 16 to 18 square feet. The site closed in June 2026.³²,³¹
• Florida and federal taxpayers (Alligator Alcatraz, Concluded) — the site cost Florida more than $1 billion. About 14% of a $608 million Federal Emergency Management Agency award had been paid by mid-September 2026.³⁵
• People held at 26 Federal Plaza (hold rooms, Blocked) — Judge Lewis Kaplan’s Sept 24, 2026 final judgment found “overcrowded, squalid, and degrading” cells, and detainees denied treatment for tuberculosis and mpox. It set enforceable standards for a class of everyone held there.⁴⁰
• Detainees at inspected facilities (DHS inspector general inspections, Unresolved) — inspector general reports published from May 28 to Oct 26, 2026 found Krome, in Miami, holding 1,102 detainees for 882 places. They found 44% of 15,975 bookings at El Paso’s hardened facility held past the 72-hour standard, with holds averaging 108 hours.⁶⁷,¹³⁴,¹³⁷
• Children in family detention (Dilley reopening, Unresolved) — ICE hired CoreCivic, which expected about $180 million in yearly revenue, in March 2025 to reopen Dilley. Dilley held hundreds of children by January 2026. Judge Fred Biery ordered the release of 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos, held there from Jan 20, 2026.⁴,²¹
• U.S. citizens (citizen detentions, Unresolved) — ProPublica counted more than 170 citizens held by Oct 16, 2025. It counted 519 citizens through Oct 21, 2026, and 36 of them were held at least a day without contact with a lawyer or family. The government keeps no count, and DHS said ICE does not arrest U.S. citizens.¹²,²⁰⁶,⁸⁴,¹⁰⁸
• U.S.-citizen children removed with a parent (citizen removals, Pending) — ProPublica counts “roughly a dozen” citizens deported, mostly children. They include three children removed to Honduras in April 2025 and a 5-year-old removed there in January 2026.⁸⁴,²⁶,²⁷,⁸⁹
• Citizens at southern Alabama worksites (Garcia Venegas v. Homan, Blocked) — Leonardo Garcia Venegas, a citizen with a REAL ID, was detained in three raids. On Sept 21, 2026 a federal judge paused worksite entry without a warrant, and continued detention after workers show evidence of citizenship.⁹⁰,⁹¹
• U.S.-citizen children of detained parents (Detained Parents Directive, In force) — ProPublica found ICE detained parents of at least 11,000 U.S.-citizen children in the term’s first seven months. That is about twice the Biden-era rate, and about 60% of those arrests ended in removal. DHS said it “cannot verify the veracity of the data” and that “ICE does not separate families.”⁸¹
• People with complaints before DHS oversight offices (Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties and detention ombudsman closures, In force) — about 600 open investigations were frozen when the offices closed on Mar 21, 2025. They included complaints of medical neglect and abuse in detention. DHS said the offices “obstructed immigration enforcement.”¹⁰
• Federal taxpayers, warehouse purchases (warehouse sites, Blocked) — ICE bought 11 warehouses, including one in Williamsport, Md. for $102.4 million for about 1,500 people. Courts blocked the Williamsport and Gilroy sites. DHS and ICE then picked several as candidates for sale (NBC News, May 29, 2026; no final decision made).⁴¹,¹²⁹

Key players

• Kristi Noem — DHS Secretary (until Mar 5, 2026) — closed CRCL and OIDO; announced the state-prison detention sites.¹⁰,¹⁸
• Markwayne Mullin — DHS Secretary (from Mar 24, 2026) — led DHS during the OIDO wind-down and the end of post-release death reporting.³⁸,³⁰,¹¹
• Ron DeSantis — Florida governor (2025–26) — built and ran Alligator Alcatraz.³
• Paula Xinis — U.S. District Judge, D. Md. (Dec 2025) — ordered Abrego Garcia released; found the government had misled the court.²⁰
• Fred Biery — U.S. District Judge, W.D. Tex. (2026) — ordered Liam Conejo Ramos released.²¹
• Todd Lyons — Acting ICE Director (2025 to May 31, 2026) — blamed the rising death toll on record detention; announced his resignation Apr 16, 2026. Former GEO Group executive David Venturella was reported to succeed him as acting director on June 1.⁹,⁸²
• Sunshine Sykes — U.S. District Judge, C.D. Cal. (Nov 2025 to Feb 2026) — cancelled the no-bond guidance for a nationwide class.¹⁴,⁷¹
• Lewis Kaplan — U.S. District Judge, S.D.N.Y. (Aug 2025 to Sept 2026) — after a trial, ordered limits on conditions in the 26 Federal Plaza hold rooms.⁴⁰

Chronology

• 2025-01-16 to 2026-10-05 — DHS stops publishing monthly enforcement tables — → ledger
• 2025-01-23 — Citizen detained in raid on a Newark seafood wholesaler — → ledger
• 2025-01-23 — Genry Ruiz Guillen dies in ICE custody (Krome Service Processing Center, Miami) — → ledger
• 2025-01-29 — Serawit Gezahegn Dejene dies in ICE custody (Eloy Detention Center, Ariz.) — → ledger
• 2025-02-03 to 02-04 — Citizen children taken to Mexico after checkpoint stop — → ledger
• 2025-02-04 — Guantánamo migrant flights begin — → ledger
• 2025-02-20 — Maksym Chernyak dies in ICE custody (Krome Service Processing Center, Miami) — → ledger
• 2025-02-23 — Juan Alexis Tineo Martinez dies in ICE custody in San Juan, P.R., two days after a sea interdiction — → ledger
• 2025-03 (early) — Family detention restored at Dilley — → ledger
• 2025-03-21 — DHS shuts its civil-rights and detention watchdogs — → ledger
• 2025-04-01 — Dexter Township, Mich., citizen handcuffed outside a courthouse near Plymouth — → ledger
• 2025-04-08 to 04-17 — Jose Hermosillo held 10 days — → ledger
• 2025-04-08 — Brayan Rayo-Garzon dies in ICE custody (Phelps County Jail, Rolla, Mo.) — → ledger
• 2025-04-16 to 04-18 — Juan Carlos Lopez-Gomez held on ICE detainer — → ledger
• 2025-04-16 — Nhon Ngoc Nguyen dies in ICE custody (El Paso Service Processing Center, Tex.) — → ledger
• 2025-04-24 — Oklahoma City citizen mother and daughters held in wrong-target raid — → ledger
• 2025-04-25 — U.S.-citizen children deported to Honduras — → ledger
• 2025-04-25 — Marie Ange Blaise dies in ICE custody (Broward Transitional Center, Pompano Beach, Fla.) — → ledger
• 2025-05-05 — Abelardo Avelleneda-Delgado dies in ICE custody during contract transport from Lowndes County Jail, Valdosta, Ga., to Stewart Detention Center — → ledger
• 2025-05-19 — Judge Reyes questions DHS restaffing promises at oversight-office hearing — → ledger
• 2025-05-20 — Sen. Peters: Guantánamo detention ~$100,000 per detainee per day — → ledger
• 2025-05-21 — Leonardo Garcia Venegas detained in Foley raid — → ledger
• 2025-06 — Court filing recasts Guantánamo as “staging for final removal” — → ledger
• 2025-06-07 — Jesus Molina-Veya dies in ICE custody (Stewart Detention Center, Lumpkin, Ga.) — → ledger
• 2025-06-18 — Agents handcuff two citizen teens in Oceanside, Calif. — → ledger
• 2025-06-18 — Omaha citizen held two nights past release at ICE’s request — → ledger
• 2025-06-23 — Johnny Noviello dies in ICE custody (Federal Detention Center Miami) — → ledger
• 2025-06-26 — Isidro Perez dies in ICE custody (Krome Service Processing Center, Miami) — → ledger
• 2025-06-28 — Merlos and four citizen children held after Peace Arch stop — → ledger
• 2025-07-01 — Trump tours Alligator Alcatraz — → ledger
• 2025-07-04 — OBBBA detention and enforcement funding — → ledger
• 2025-07-08 — ICE mandatory-detention guidance; Sykes class judgment; certiorari granted Oct 1, 2026 — → ledger
• 2025-07-10 — Camarillo raid; citizen veteran held three days; FTCA suit (2026) — → ledger
• 2025-07-19 — Tien Xuan Phan dies in ICE custody (Karnes County Immigration Processing Center, Tex.) — → ledger
• 2025-07-23 — Brownsville citizen siblings detained while filming — → ledger
• 2025-07-31 — Honduras families file J.L.V. v. Acuna — → ledger
• 2025-08-01 — Army begins paying for Camp East Montana at Fort Bliss; first detainees arrive mid-August — → ledger
• 2025-08-05 — Chaofeng Ge dies at Moshannon Valley — → ledger
• 2025-08-12 — Kaplan TRO on 26 Federal Plaza hold rooms — → ledger
• 2025-08-19 — Nebraska’s McCook camp to hold detainees (“Cornhusker Clink”) — → ledger
• 2025-08-21 — Alligator Alcatraz wind-down order — → ledger
• 2025-08-31 — Lorenzo Antonio Batrez Vargas dies in ICE custody (Central Arizona Florence Correctional Complex) — → ledger
• 2025-09-03 — DHS announces “Louisiana Lockup” at Angola; branded state-prison sites — → ledger
• 2025-09-04 — Hyundai–LG raid; two citizens detained — → ledger
• 2025-09-04 — Cato, N.Y., food-plant raid — → ledger
• 2025-09-04 — 11th Circuit stays Alligator Alcatraz wind-down order — → ledger
• 2025-09-08 — Oscar Duarte Rascon dies in ICE custody (Eloy Detention Center, Ariz.) — → ledger
• 2025-09-12 — ICE officer fatally shoots Silverio Villegas González during an arrest in Franklin Park, Ill. — → ledger
• 2025-09-17 — Kaplan preliminary injunction on 26 Federal Plaza hold rooms — → ledger
• 2025-09-18 — New York officials arrested at 26 Federal Plaza — → ledger
• 2025-09-18 — Santos Banegas Reyes dies in ICE custody (Nassau County Correctional Center, East Meadow, N.Y.) — → ledger
• 2025-09-22 — Ismael Ayala Uribe dies in ICE custody (Adelanto ICE Processing Center, Calif.) — → ledger
• 2025-09-24 — Sniper attack on Dallas ICE office kills two detainees — → ledger
• 2025-09-29 — Huabing Xie dies in ICE custody (Imperial Regional Detention Facility, Calexico, Calif.) — → ledger
• 2025-10-04 — Leo Cruz-Silva dies in ICE custody (Ste. Genevieve County Jail, Mo.) — → ledger
• 2025-10-11 — Hasan Ali Moh’d Saleh dies in ICE custody (Krome Service Processing Center, Miami) — → ledger
• 2025-10-14 — Merlos removal case terminated — → ledger
• 2025-10-16 — ProPublica counts U.S. citizens detained — → ledger
• 2025-10-23 — Souvannarath removed to Laos despite order — → ledger
• 2025-10-23 — Josué Castro Rivera is struck and killed on a Norfolk interstate while fleeing an ICE vehicle stop — → ledger
• 2025-10-23 — Gabriel Garcia-Aviles dies in ICE custody (Adelanto ICE Processing Center, Calif.) — → ledger
• 2025-10-25 — Kai Yin Wong dies in ICE custody (South Texas ICE Processing Center, Pearsall) — → ledger
• 2025-10-27 — Merlos released and reunited with her children — → ledger
• 2025-12-03 — Francisco Gaspar-Andres dies at Camp East Montana — → ledger
• 2025-12-05 — Pete Sumalo Montejo dies in ICE custody (Montgomery Processing Center, Conroe, Tex.) — → ledger
• 2025-12-06 — Shiraz Fateh Ali Sachiwani dies in ICE custody (Prairieland Detention Center, Alvarado, Tex.) — → ledger
• 2025-12-09 — Senate PSI Democrats’ “Unchecked Authority” report — → ledger
• 2025-12-11 — Xinis frees Abrego Garcia — → ledger
• 2025-12-12 — Jean Wilson Brutus dies in ICE custody (Delaney Hall, Newark, N.J.) — → ledger
• 2025-12-14 to 2026-01-07 — Dulce Consuelo Díaz Morales held 25 days — → ledger
• 2025-12-14 — Fouad Saeed Abdulkadir dies in ICE custody (Moshannon Valley Processing Center, Pa.) — → ledger
• 2025-12-14 — Delvin Francisco Rodriguez dies in ICE custody (Adams County Correctional Center, Natchez, Miss.) — → ledger
• 2025-12-15 — Cobb stays seven-day notice rule for congressional visits — → ledger
• 2025-12 (late) — 2025 deadliest year in ICE detention since 2004 — → ledger
• 2025-12-15 — Nenko Stanev Gantchev dies in ICE custody (North Lake Correctional Facility, Baldwin, Mich.) — → ledger
• 2025-12-20 — Citizen 4-year-old detained with her mother in New York — → ledger
• 2026-01-03 — Lunas Campos death ruled homicide — → ledger
• 2026-01-03 — ICE reports 12,000+ officers hired — → ledger
• 2026-01-05 — Luis Nunez Caceres dies in ICE custody (Joe Corley Processing Center, Conroe, Tex.) — → ledger
• 2026-01-06 — Luis Yanez Cruz dies in ICE custody (Imperial Regional Detention Facility, Calexico, Calif.) — → ledger
• 2026-01-08 — Noem reimposes seven-day notice rule by memo — → ledger
• 2026-01-09 — Parady La dies after arrest — → ledger
• 2026-01-11 — 5-year-old citizen deported to Honduras — → ledger
• 2026-01-14 — Victor Manuel Diaz dies at Camp East Montana — → ledger
• 2026-01 (mid) — Record detention population — → ledger
• 2026-01-09 — Agents point guns at citizen siblings in Donna, Texas, family alleges — → ledger
• 2026-01-14 — Heber Sanchez Dominguez dies in ICE custody (Robert A. Deyton Detention Facility, Lovejoy, Ga.) — → ledger
• 2026-01-16 — ICE buys Williamsport warehouse, one of 11 it bought — → ledger
• 2026-01-20 — Liam Conejo Ramos detained, later released — → ledger
• 2026-02-02 — Cobb TRO against reimposed notice rule — → ledger
• 2026-02-05 — Inspector general lists reviews, including citizen arrests — → ledger
• 2026-02-14 — DHS funding lapse; ICE runs on OBBBA money — → ledger
• 2026-02-16 — Lorth Sim dies in ICE custody (Miami Correctional Center, Bunker Hill, Ind.) — → ledger
• 2026-02-16 — Jairo Garcia Hernandez dies in ICE custody while assigned to Krome and held at Larkin Community Hospital Behavioral Health — → ledger
• 2026-02-18 — Provinzino civil-contempt finding in Minnesota habeas case — → ledger
• 2026-02-20 — Provinzino says no fine will be imposed — → ledger
• 2026-02-25 — Blind refugee found dead after release; Paktiawal death; citizen Brian Morales deported — → ledger
• 2026-02-27 — Alberto Gutierrez Reyes dies in ICE custody (Adelanto ICE Processing Center, Calif.) — → ledger
• 2026-03-01 — Pejman Karshenas Najafabadi dies in ICE custody (Louisiana ICE Processing Center, Angola) — → ledger
• 2026-03-02 — Cobb §705 stay of reimposed notice rule — → ledger
• 2026-03-02 — Emmanuel Damas dies in ICE custody (Central Arizona Florence Correctional Center) — → ledger
• 2026-03-05 — Noem fired — → ledger
• 2026-03-09 — Orlando citizen twins put on removal flight — → ledger
• 2026-03-11 — Hurson TRO against Williamsport warehouse site — → ledger
• 2026-03-14 — Mohammad Nazeer Paktiawal dies after illness in Dallas ICE hold room — → ledger
• 2026-03-16 — Royer Perez Jimenez dies in ICE custody (Glades County Detention Center, Moore Haven, Fla.) — → ledger
• 2026-03-20 — Blackwell orders clergy access at Whipple Building — → ledger
• 2026-03-23 — ProPublica: parents of 11,000+ citizen children detained — → ledger
• 2026-03-25 — Jose Guadalupe Ramos Solano dies in ICE custody (Adelanto ICE Processing Center, Calif.) — → ledger
• 2026-04-01 — Tuan Van Bui dies in ICE custody (Miami Correctional Center, Bunker Hill, Ind.) — → ledger
• 2026-04-03 — Brian Morales García stopped near Fredericksburg; ICE called — → ledger
• 2026-04-07 — Morales García removed to Mexico — → ledger
• 2026-04-11 — Alejandro Cabrera Clemente dies in ICE custody (Winn Correctional Center, Winnfield, La.) — → ledger
• 2026-04-12 — Aled Carbonell Betancourt dies in ICE custody (Federal Detention Center Miami) — → ledger
• 2026-04-15 — Hurson preliminary injunction against Williamsport warehouse site — → ledger
• 2026-04-16 — Acting ICE Director Lyons announces departure — → ledger
• 2026-04-20 — House Oversight Democrats refer 189 citizen incidents to inspector general — → ledger
• 2026-04-21 — 11th Circuit vacates Alligator Alcatraz injunction — → ledger
• 2026-04-24 — MALDEF FTCA claims for Brownsville siblings — → ledger
• 2026-04-28 — Second Circuit rejects no-bond policy, splitting with the Fifth and Eighth Circuits — → ledger
• 2026-04-28 — Denny Adan Gonzalez dies in ICE custody (Stewart Detention Center, Lumpkin, Ga.) — → ledger
• 2026-04-30 — DHS funding lapse ends after 76 days — → ledger
• 2026-05-06 — ICE agents tackle Bronx citizen Jeury Concepcion — → ledger
• 2026-05-07 — DHS tells NPR “Congress did” shut the detention ombudsman office — → ledger
• 2026-05-08 — D.C. Circuit denies stay of notice-rule order — → ledger
• 2026-05-20 to 05-21 — Citizen booked at Basile after Lafayette checkpoint — → ledger
• 2026-05-22 — Delaney Hall hunger strike — → ledger
• 2026-05-28 — Inspector general Chantilly report opens 2026 detention-report series — → ledger
• 2026-05-29 — NBC: several ICE warehouses identified as candidates for sale — → ledger
• 2026-06-02 — Inspector general: Winn Correctional fails detention standards — → ledger
• 2026-06-04 — ICE stops reporting post-release deaths — → ledger
• 2026-06-04 — Mamuka Artmeladze dies in ICE custody (Winn Correctional Center, Winnfield, La.) — → ledger
• 2026-06-19 — Felix Alcorta-Rodriguez dies in ICE custody (Webb County Detention Center, Laredo, Tex.) — → ledger
• 2026-06-24 — Adrian Florian dies in ICE custody (Port Isabel Service Processing Center, Los Fresnos, Tex.) — → ledger
• 2026-06-25 — HRW/PHR report: 52 deaths, Jan 2025 to June 2026 — → ledger
• 2026-06-25 — Alligator Alcatraz closure confirmed — → ledger
• 2026-07-13 — Jesus Manuel Arenas Silva dies in ICE custody during a bus transfer from Irwin County Detention Center, Ocilla, Ga. — → ledger
• 2026-07-22 — Jose Chajon-Raxon dies after a medical emergency at Delaney Hall; DHS says it had released him — → ledger
• 2026-07-23 — Inspector general: ICE health records system does not fully meet medical-record transfer needs — → ledger
• 2026-07-24 — Prisciliano Trejo Ricano dies nine days after ICE released him from Stewart while he was in a coma — → ledger
• 2026-08-01 — Edwin Lopez Cornejo dies in ICE custody (Delaney Hall, Newark, N.J.) — → ledger
• 2026-08-23 — Lianyong Wei dies in ICE custody (CNMI Department of Corrections, Saipan) — → ledger
• 2026-08-30 — Morales García readmitted at Laredo — → ledger
• 2026-08 (late) — ICE flies Somali men to Guantánamo — → ledger
• 2026-09-10 — Cato workers file Rojas v. McCoy — → ledger
• 2026-09-11 — Lee enjoins Gilroy holding facility — → ledger
• 2026-09-11 — Inspector general: Krome 25% over capacity — → ledger
• 2026-09-14 — Inspector general confirms Alligator Alcatraz cages; FEMA award ~14% paid — → ledger
• 2026-09-18 — Carlos Josue Marchena-Marchena dies in ICE custody at Winn Correctional Center, Winnfield, La. (announced, not posted) — → ledger
• 2026-09-20 — Evanston citizen detained for fingerprinting — → ledger
• 2026-09-21 — Garcia Venegas v. Homan stays Alabama worksite practices — → ledger
• 2026-09-24 — Kaplan final judgment on 26 Federal Plaza hold rooms — → ledger
• 2026-09-28 — Inspector general: Cibola use-of-force noncompliance — → ledger
• 2026-09-28 — Inspector general: ICE detention-space contracts poorly planned — → ledger
• 2026-09-29 — Julian Curo-Churata dies in ICE custody after being held at Richwood Correctional Center, Monroe, La. (announced, not posted) — → ledger
• 2026-09-30 — FY2026 ends with 36 deaths — → ledger
• 2026-10-06 — ProPublica publishes database of more than 500 citizens detained — → ledger
• 2026-10-06 — Abrego Garcia Liberia hearing canceled — → ledger
• 2026-10-15 — H.R. 10826 introduced — → ledger
• 2026-10-17 — Andrade-Covarrubias found dead in Laredo — → ledger
• 2026-10-19 — Minnesota judge orders re-release and warns of sanctions over re-arrest — → ledger
• 2026-10-21 — House Democrats ask Mullin for citizen-detention count — → ledger
• 2026-10-23 — Luis Sandoval dies in ICE custody at Folkston D. Ray ICE Processing Center, Folkston, Ga. — → ledger
• 2026-10-24 — Roberto Jimenez Gutierrez dies in ICE custody at Otay Mesa Detention Center, San Diego — → ledger
• 2026-10-26 — Kelly holds Blanche, Mullin and Rife in civil contempt over a release order — → ledger
• 2026-10-26 — Inspector general: El Paso holds average 108 hours — → ledger
• 2026-10-29 — Fran Gregory Portillo-Zapata dies in ICE custody at a San Antonio hospital, where he had been since Sept 30 while detained at Karnes County — → ledger
• 2026-10-29 — ProPublica update: 519 citizens — → ledger
• 2026-11-02 — Kasubhai finds ICE violated his order and an officer lied in an arrest report — → ledger
• 2026-11-03 — Crews orders release of a man ICE re-arrested minutes after freeing him — → ledger
• 2026-11-06 — ICE arrests a Wisconsin state trooper with a pending asylum case; released the next day — → ledger
• 2026-11-09 — Tunheim weighs contempt over ICE’s second re-arrest of a man he ordered freed — → ledger
• 2026-11-09 — Denver ICE head testifies he ordered re-arrests of people freed by judges — → ledger
• 2026-11-09 — EFE: ICE internal reviews find poor medical care in at least 23 of 29 deaths — → ledger

Sources