Pressroom

Washington, DC — As Senator Markwayne Mullin undergoes his confirmation hearing today to become the new Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Stacy Suh, Program Director at Detention Watch Network issued the following comment on Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the state of the administration’s immigration detention expansion plans:

“We are glad to see Noem gone, and yet the musical chairs over who holds leadership within the administration, a trademark of Trump’s first term, does not solve the systemic issues with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). The evidence against ICE is indisputable. ICE kills people and threatens community safety across the country. No one is safe when ICE is present – whether on the streets or in one of the agency’s more than 200 abuse-ridden detention facilities. Shockingly, 12 people have died in ICE custody this calendar year — more than double the number of deaths at this point last year, and 43 deaths total under this administration.

Deaths in ICE custody continue to skyrocket past previous record highs amidst the Trump administration’s massive expansion of immigration detention and increasing ICE violence. Pursuing a cruel, multi-layered plan, Trump has proliferated ICE operations into other government agencies, including the Bureau of Prisons and the Department of Defense, using military bases as deportation hubs and growing ICE partnerships with local sheriffs and county jails. The administration has expanded surveillance, brought back family detention, incarcerated people in an abusive mega-prison in El Salvador, carried out third country deportations, and increased neighborhood and workplace raids that destabilize communities and disappear people, including activists who oppose Trump’s agenda. ICE then funnels people into its network of private prisons, county jails, state and federal prisons, and makeshift detention camps, often sowing fear and confusion with facility transfers.

Currently, ICE is detaining more than 70,000 people in its existing network of detention centers and has stated plans to expand its capacity to be able to detain more than 100,000 people at a given time. Looming large is the imminent threat of warehouses to detain up to 92,600 people across the country. Despite recent reporting that indicates a slowdown on the detention warehouses proposal, we know that ICE operates from a place of secrecy and chaos — executing without expressed plans and warning, circumventing local legislation and ignoring growing community opposition nationwide. We urge communities across the country to continue fighting vigorously against detention warehouses and all other detention facilities. Immigration detention puts lives in jeopardy, subjects people to abuse, and separates loved ones at a cost to all Americans. The administration’s cruel mass detention and deportation agenda is dire and must be stopped, regardless of who’s at the helm of DHS.”

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