Featured Issue: Immigration Detention and Alternatives to Detention
Update: On March 14, 2025, AILA released a statement in response to the Trump Administration resuming the practice of detaining families pending their court proceedings in the detention facility in Karnes County, TX, and indicating its plans to use a second facility in Dilley, TX, for family detention.
AILA calls on Congress to significantly reduce and phase out the use of immigration detention for immigration enforcement purposes. Detention is costly, leads to inefficiencies in processing cases, and has a long track record of human rights abuses. Community-based case management services and legal representation is more humane and should be offered to noncitizens to support their compliance of immigration obligations.
Contents
By the Numbers
- Book Outs/Books In: The Office of Homeland Security Statistics provides data on the number of migrants who are released from CBP custody to proceed with removal cases, transfers to ICE detention, and transfers to Health & Human Services (HHS). It also provides initial book-in data on ICE detention.
- Detention: For FY2024, Congress has provided funding to detain a daily average of 41,500 noncitizens at a cost of approximately $3.4 billion. During FY2023, Congress provided funding to detain a daily average of 34,000 noncitizens at a cost of approximately $2.9 billion. A December 2024 ICE memo in response to Congressional requests for information noted that increasing detention capacity by more than 60,000 beds will require a funding increase of approximately $3.2 billion dollars.
- Current Population: Per ICE, on December 8, 2024, there were 39,062 people in custody and on January 22, 2025, there were 39,703. For future data, see bi-weekly data posted on the ICE website under “Fiscal Year 2025 statistics” here.
- Daily Costs: Projected average daily costs of detaining an adult noncitizen: $164.65. The actual cost of detaining a noncitizen varies based on geographic region, length of detention, facility type, etc. A recent ICE memo in response to the costs of expanding detention noted that they expect a 5% inflationary increase from FY2024 enacted bed costs.
- Deaths at Adult Detention Centers - AILA supplies a continually updated list of ICE press releases announcing deaths in adult immigration detention. Note: there can be delays in ICE’s reporting of deaths and there have been instances of seriously ill individuals released from ICE custody, whose deaths are not included in this list.
- ICE Alternatives to Detention: For FY2024, Congress provided approximately $470 million in funding for ICE’s Alternatives to Detention (ADT) program. This is an increase from approximately $443 million in FY2023 in which 194,427 people were enrolled.
- Daily Costs of ICE ATD: Average daily cost for participants enrolled in ICE’s Intensive Appearance Supervision Program (ISAP): $8.00
- Community-Based Case Management: The FEMA/CRCL Case Management Pilot Program (CMPP), also known as the “Alternatives to Detention Grant Program,” received $15 million in continued funding for FY2024. Prior to January 20, 2025, it was operating in five cities.
- Average daily cost of providing case management for individual family members by a community-based organization (2018 pilot): $14.05
- Legal Representation: There is no right to a government-provided attorney in immigration court and 70 percent of detained persons face proceedings without counsel. There is a pilot program that serves adult individuals with mental disabilities. Congress did not provide any funding for adult legal representation for FY2024.
AILA’s Recommendations to Congress
- Reduce detention funding to at least 25,000 average daily population or less.
- Explicitly prohibit detention funding from being used to detain families and children in custodial settings.
- Provide continued funding community-based case management programs outside of ICE such as the Case Management Pilot Program (CMPP) operated by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties (CRCL)
- Conduct robust oversight of past congressional appropriations transparency requirements and continue to require ICE to disclose and publish information relating to detention contracts, inspection process and reports, detention data, and policies for the alternatives to detention program.
Background
Created in 2002, Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE) has over 22,000 full-time employees, with a total annual budget of more than $9 billion. The agency has three core operational directorates: Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO), Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), and the Office of the Principal Legal Advisor (OPLA). Housed within the Department of Homeland Security, ICE joins Customs & Border Protection (CBP) in making up the nation’s largest police force.
Immigration enforcement, including taking noncitizens into custody, is the largest single area of responsibility for ICE. ICE detains noncitizens arrested from the interior of the country and those transferred from the border. Twenty-years ago, the average daily population of detained immigrants was approximately 7,000. During the first Trump Administration, it reached a height of 50,000 average daily population. Regardless of the circumstances of their first encounter with authorities, noncitizens are detained across America in a sprawling network of private and public detention facilities. Most of these facilities operate through contracts between ICE (or, less commonly, the U.S. Marshals Service) and localities for the purposes of detaining noncitizens. In some cases, localities later sub-contract services for operating detention facilities to private prison companies. In other instances, localities reserve space in local, county, or state jails and prisons for the purposes of detaining immigrants. In all cases, localities are financially incentivized to detain individuals to increase profit margins from contracts. One key part of the financial equation is the use of noncitizens to clean and maintain facilities in exchange for $1 a day.
Immigration detention facilities, regardless of the type of contracts, have been the sites of serious and repeated allegations of abuse, including allegations of sexual assault, violations of religious freedom, medical neglect, and the punitive use of solitary confinement. In 2020, the U.S. had the highest number of deaths in ICE adult detention since 2005. Several deaths in custody have been found to have been preventable. Conditions in ICE custody have been described as “barbaric” and “negligent” by DHS experts.
Civil immigration detention works mainly to facilitate deportation. While ICE has the authority to allow most noncitizens to continue with their removal cases on the outside of custody, it often defaults to detention based on alleged “flight risk or threat to public safety.” The vagueness of these concepts frequently works against the liberty interests of noncitizens and there is generally a lack of uniformity when it comes to these discretionary releases. Only a certain portion of the overall noncitizen population must be detained under “mandatory detention” laws and even those individuals may be released based on certain exceptions.
Lastly, because immigration detention is considered “civil,” indigent noncitizens are not generally provided counsel. As a result, representation rates for noncitizens in detention are as low as 14% and directly correlate with the ability to secure release or long-term protection.
Reports and Briefings
- "No Human Being Should Be Held There": The Mistreatment of LGBTQ and HIV-Positive People in U.S. Federal Immigration Jails
- Physicians for Human Rights: Endless Nightmare”: Torture and Inhuman Treatment in Solitary Confinement in U.S. Immigration Detention
- Harvard University Press Release: New Report Documents the Mental and Physical Harm Experienced by Children in Immigration Detention
- AILA Policy Brief: Case Management: An Effective and Humane Alternative to Detention - November 2, 2022
- AILA Policy Brief: Moving The Nation Forward by Leaving Immigration Detention Behind - March 25, 2021
- The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA): Emergency Medical Responses at US Immigration and Customs Enforcement Detention Centers in California -November 29, 2023
- Notable findings include: a number of EMS calls for pregnant people at Otay Mesa; a shockingly low number of 911 calls for psychiatric emergencies, despite the high number of complaints of serious mental health issues in the detention centers; nearly a third of all detained people had an abnormal vital sign when EMS encountered them, a disturbing trend given the association between abnormal vital signs and deaths in ICE custody; and finally, the number of emergency calls that the authors could find in EMS systems was significantly lower than the number of ICE-reported medical emergencies, a serious discrepancy that calls into question why ICE facilities aren’t calling 911 more frequently when there is an emergency happening.
- Black Alliance for Just Immigration: Uncovering the Truth: Violence and Abuse Against Black Migrants in Immigration Detention - October 2022
- Oxfam America and the Tahirih Justice Center: Surviving Deterrence: How U.S. Asylum Deterrence Policies Normalize Gender-Based Violence, October 11, 2022
- Law Professor César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández, TED Talk, The US can move past immigration prisons—and towards justice, July 27, 2022
- Alternatives to Detention: An Overview – American Immigration Council Fact Sheet, March 17, 2022
- Community Support for Migrants Navigating the U.S. Immigration System - February 26, 2021
- American Immigration Council Special Report: "Measuring In Absentia Removal in Immigration Court," Ingrid Eagly, Esq. and Steven Shafer, Esq. - January 28, 2021
Government Reports
- DHS Office of Inspector General: website has search function to view ICE detention audits, inspections, and evaluations completed by DHS OIG.
- ICE FOIA Library: Holds detention facility contracts, facility reviews, among other required posting information.
- U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO): Agency within the legislative branch that provides auditing, evaluative, and investigative services for the United States Congress. Website has search function to view audits done of ICE detention programs and policies.
- Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman Annual Report– June 20, 2023. As of January 29, 2025, the 2024 Annual Report had not been published.
- DHS Office of Civil Rights & Civil Liberties Recommendation and Investigation Memo Collection: CRCL investigates abuses in immigration detention. CRCL issues recommendations to the relevant DHS Component aimed at addressing any civil rights or civil liberties concerns identified as part of its investigation.
- DHS Advisory Committee Final Report on Family Residential Centers - September 30, 2016.
Legislative and Administrative Advocacy
- The Case Management Pilot Program: A Humane, Effective Alternative to Immigration Detention - August 15, 2024
- Senators Send Letter Urging Appropriators to Include Funding for ATD - May 15, 2024
- AILA Statement to Senate on ICE's Use of Solitary Confinement - April 16, 2024
- AILA Sends Letter to White House Opposing Family Detention – March 13, 2023
- AILA and Partners Send Letter to White House Urging Closure of ICE Detention Sites - November 21, 2022
- Members of Congress Send Letter to DHS on Access to Counsel - November 3, 2022
- Over 100 House Democrats Send Letter to DHS to Halt Immigration Detention - March 10, 2022
Browse the Featured Issue: Immigration Detention and Alternatives to Detention collection
Handwritten Letter from Thirty Mothers Held at Berks Family Detention Center
Thirty mothers detained with their children at the Berks Family Detention Center wrote a letter to the media pleading for their freedom; the letter is in Spanish, an English translation is available.
Families Detained for Months on End Plead for Their Freedom
Thirty mothers detained with their children at the Berks Family Detention Center in Pennsylvania wrote a letter to the media pleading for their freedom. The mothers write that they came to the U.S. seeking refuge, and that they want their prolonged and cruel detention to be known.
Eight of Twelve Families Targeted by ICE Have Been Released
After being held in detention for more than a month by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), eight families rounded up by ICE at the beginning of January have finally been released from detention while their cases proceed.
CARA: Central American Mothers Targeted in Immigration Raids and Still Detained Pen Letter to President Obama
Seven women picked up and detained by ICE in early January in widely publicized raids have made a direct and personal plea to President Obama to allow their release while they pursue ongoing appeals of their deportation orders.
Letter Revoking Berks County Residential Center’s Operating License
In this 1/27/16 letter, the Pennsylvania Department of Human Service informed DHS that it would not renew and would revoke the operating license for the Berks County Residential Facility, the immigration detention center that jails mothers and children in Leesport, PA.
ICE Information Collection on Electronic Bonds Online (eBonds) Access
ICE 60-day notice on an information collection for review on Form No. I-352SA/I-352RA; Electronic Bonds Online (eBonds) Access. Comments are due on 3/28/16. (81 FR 4332, 1/26/16)
TRAC Report Finds PEP Has Had Little Impact on ICE Detainer Use
A TRAC report found that the 7,117 detainers issued by ICE during October 2015 suggests that the Priority Enforcement Program (PEP), which replaced the Secure Communities program in June 2015, appears to have had only a modest impact on ICE's use of detainers.
AILA and LatinoJustice Comments on International Rate Regulation for Inmate Calling Services
On 1/19/16, AILA and LatinoJustice submitted a joint comment to the Federal Communication Commission on the International Rate Regulation for Inmate Calling Services.
AILA’s Recommendation To Ensure Vulnerable Central Americans Are Treated Fairly and Humanely and Are Protected from Deportation
AILA urges the president and DHS to halt the raids and deportations of vulnerable Central Americans and recommends that procedures be established that ensure these families receive fair and humane treatment and can meaningfully seek humanitarian protection under U.S. law.
CARA: 33 Mothers and Children Protected from Immediate Deportation
After successfully halting the removal of 33 Central American mothers and children rounded up by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the CARA Family Detention Pro Bono Project called on the Obama administration to release the families confined at Dilley.
District Court Grants Writ of Habeas Corpus to Detainee Held for Twenty-Six Months
The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas granted the petition for a writ of habeas corpus, holding that the petitioner's detention of more than twenty-six months was unreasonable, and that the appropriate remedy was a bond hearing. Courtesy of Carlos Spector.
Notice Regarding Interest Rate Paid on Cash Deposited to Secure ICE Immigration Bonds
Notice that for the period beginning 1/1/16, and ending on 3/31/16, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Immigration bond interest rate is 0.14 per centum per annum. (81 FR 1289, 1/11/16)
District Court Allows Class Action Lawsuit over Conditions at CBP Detention Facility to Proceed
The U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona allowed a class action lawsuit filed by detainees against CBP over alleged inhumane treatment and conditions at a CBP detention facility to move forward. (Unknown Parties v. Johnson, et. al., 1/11/16)
ICE Factsheet on the Family Case Management Program
ICE released a Fact Sheet announcing that it will commence the Family Case Management Program (FCMP) on 1/21/16 in select metropolitan areas. FCMP is a new alternative to detention (ATD) initiative that uses qualified case managers to promote participant compliance with immigration obligations.
CARA Family Detention Pro Bono Project Succeeds in Winning Stays of Deportation of Four Mothers and Their Children Recently Rounded-Up by ICE
Last night, the CARA Family Detention Pro Bono Project succeeded in halting the deportation of four Central American families apprehended by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) over the weekend, who had been scheduled for deportation this morning.
AILA and the Council Letter to DHS Secretary Johnson on Raids Targeting Central American Families
On 1/6/16, AILA and the Council requested a meeting with Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Jeh Johnson to discuss the agency’s current aggressive tactics to apprehend and deport Central American families.
After Successfully Delaying the Deportations of Four Central American Families, Groups Demand Meeting with DHS Secretary Johnson
AILA and the American Immigration Council sent a letter to DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson criticizing raids to remove asylum-seeking Central American families and calling for a meeting to discuss how to guarantee due process and the necessary humanitarian protections for those families.
Defend, Don’t Target, the Vulnerable
On Christmas Eve, news leaked that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was going to begin raids to round up and deport Central American families. Over the holiday week, stakeholders, legislators, community leaders, and advocates pushed back hard on these planned raids and begged the Obama Admi
AILA Condemns Raids on Vulnerable Central American Families
AILA President Victor Nieblas Pradis condemned reports of ICE raids targeting Central American families saying, “Rounding up mothers and children who have fled the most violent region in the western hemisphere and are trying to find refuge abrogates our legal obligations.”
District Court Orders ICE Detainee Be Held in Psychiatric Facility to Receive Mental Health Treatment
The court granted the mentally incompetent plaintiff-petitioner's preliminary injunction, ordering that she be held at a psychiatric facility for mental health treatment targeted towards restoring her to mental competence. Courtesy of Kerry Doyle. (Doan v. Bergeron, et al., 12/31/15)
Letter to USCIS and ICE Concerning Due Process Violations at Detention Facilities
Joint letter from AILA, the American Immigration Council, CLINIC, RAICES, and Human Rights First to USCIS and ICE concerning glaring due process violations which have led to the deportation of families with valid claims for asylum or other protection under U.S. law.
Denial of Due Process to Incarcerated Immigrant Families Worsens in Spite of Court Ruling
Attorneys and advocates called the government to account for rushing detained children and mothers through the legal processes designed to protect them from danger; glaring due process violations have led to the deportation of families with valid claims for asylum or other protection under U.S. law.
CA1 Limits Attorney General’s Discretion to Use Mandatory Detention Provision
The court affirmed the district court, holding that the bar to bonded release found in the detention mandate applies only to those specified criminal noncitizens whom the Attorney General took into custody when they were released from criminal custody. (Castañeda v. Souza, 12/23/15)
District Court Awards $125,000 in Attorneys' Fees in Class Action Suit over Conditional Parole
The court finalized a settlement agreement providing that DOJ will pay a class of immigrants $125,000 in attorneys' fees to close out a lawsuit alleging that the IJs in the Seattle and Tacoma immigration courts uniformly denied requests for conditional parole. (Rivera v. Lynch, 12/18/15)
CARA Urges Texas Officials To Deny Child Care Licenses to Detention Centers in Dilley and Karnes
On 12/11/15, the CARA Pro Bono Project submitted a letter to the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services urging the agency not to adopt proposed amendments to the Texas Human Resources Code that would facilitate licensing the family detention centers in Texas as child care facilities.