Civil Immigration Jail on Track to Surpass Federal Criminal System

American Immigration Council Report & OIA Reaction

Congress should cut ICE budget to force it to focus. Sheriffs should end civil detention contracts and stop destroying families. 

Watch: Medical neglect in Butler County Jail, an ICE contract facility (Spectrum News)

In early January, Geraldo Lunas Campos died in civil immigration jail in Texas, choked to death by a guard. Last year, 32 people died in immigration jail, making 2025 the deadliest year since Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) was founded. Despite the dangers, the Trump administration continues to rapidly grow the nation’s civil immigration system, with help from Congress and some county sheriffs. 

Unless something changes, the civil immigration jail system is “on track to rival the entire federal criminal prison system by the end of President Trump’s second term in office,” according to a new American Immigration Council report. 

Said Lynn Tramonte, Executive Director of the Ohio Immigrant Alliance, “We have to understand what immigration jail is. It’s putting people who are not being charged with crimes in a criminal jail, to coerce them to give up their immigration cases and agree to be deported. We’re doing this to people who have lived in Ohio for decades, being good neighbors and raising strong families. People who are following the law and attending immigration court hearings. This is a morally bankrupt system that destroys families and lives.” 

Tramonte continued, “Instead of allowing this system to grow and kill more people, Congress should cut the ICE budget to force the Trump administration to focus its work. And state and local police should stop participating in the destruction of our families and communities. End these county-ICE jail contracts. We don’t need to participate in a system that harms people. Instead, we need Congress to update the immigration laws and make them work for today’s realities.”  

Key takeaways from the American Immigration Council report

“Immigration Detention Expansion in Trump’s Second Term” (American Immigration Council) looks at the dramatic growth of immigration jail in 2025, as well as policy changes, commitments, and funding trends through 2029. The report reveals:

• The federal government went from incarcerating 40,000 people under “civil” immigration authorities at the end of the Biden administration to upwards of 68,000 people at the end of 2025 — an increase of almost 75%. 

• The Trump administration has plans to grow the civil immigration jail population to at least 108,000 people, and eventually 135,000 or more. 

• Congress is on track to fund civil immigration detention up to $15 billion per year, nearly double the $8.6 billion budget of the Federal Bureau of Prisons.  

• To feed the growing immigration prison system, federal agents are demanding the papers of people they come across in the community, and involving state and local police in the enforcement of civil immigration laws — rather than focusing on specific individuals with a criminal history. As a result, there was a 2,450% increase in the number of people without criminal records held in ICE jail.

What is immigration jail?

The federal government uses county jails and, in some cases, private prisons or other detention centers, in its enforcement of civil immigration laws. It’s important to understand that people in civil immigration jail are being accused of civil immigration violations — not crimes — and have cases that are (or were) processed in civil immigration court. 

They are not in jail to be charged with crimes, even though they are incarcerated in criminal jails. (The limited number of immigrants who are charged with criminal violations of immigration law, most typically “re-entry after deportation” or “entering the country without inspection,” are incarcerated in the federal prison system, not immigration jails. They have cases in federal criminal court, not civil immigration court.)

Why does immigration jail exist?

In matters of civil law, violations are adjudicated by civil courts and the parties involved are typically not incarcerated in criminal jails. Immigration is the exception, for now. Congress authorized the detention of people with civil immigration cases for two specific purposes, according to the Congressional Research Service: 

First, detention may ensure an apprehended alien's presence at his or her removal hearing and, if the alien is ultimately ordered removed, makes it easier for removal to be quickly effectuated. Second, in some cases detention may serve the additional purpose of alleviating any threat posed by the alien to the safety of the community while the removal process is under way.

By arresting people who pose no threat to the community and are already attending court hearings and ICE check-in appointments — following the law — the government is showing that the real purpose of immigration jail is punishment. Some lawyers have been successful in obtaining their clients’ freedom from immigration jail in federal court, due to the administration’s extreme detention policies. 

Why do we say immigration jail is “extreme”?

Incarcerating someone who has not been convicted of a crime is extreme. It is cruel and unusual to incarcerate people due to an alleged violation of civil law. It also costs the U.S. taxpayers money. In every area of civil law but immigration, we use enforcement mechanisms that benefit society by bringing law violators into compliance, instead of costing us more money. For example, someone who hasn’t paid their federal taxes enters into a payment agreement with the IRS, not an IRS jail.

Compliance should (and could) be the goal of civil immigration law enforcement, too. But right now, the goal is punishment, and it is used to deter immigration. U.S. immigration policy is generally about increasing the personal risk of migration so that (in theory) some people decide not to try. Policy has become even crueler and more deadly under the Trump administration.

Recall that immigrants in ICE civil jail are subject to the same conditions as people incarcerated for criminal reasons: deprivation of liberty; loss of employment/income, coupled with increased costs to maintain communication with lawyers and loved ones; potentially fatal restrictions on medical care; poor food, abuse by guards, and boredom; and psychological damage that comes with the loss of control over their day-to-day life, alienation from family and community, and worries about the future. Unlike criminal incarceration, individuals in immigration jail have no fixed timeframe for when their incarceration will end, and are not guaranteed a lawyer to help them navigate the complex legal system.

What’s more, immigration detention can be fatal. Last year was ICE’s deadliest year on record, with 32 deaths of individuals under their care and custody. The Guardian explained that detained immigrants: “died of seizure and heart failure, stroke, respiratory failure, tuberculosis or suicide. Some died at ICE detention centers and field offices, others after they had been transferred to hospitals, but were still under ICE custody. In some cases, their families and lawyers have alleged, they died of neglect, after repeatedly trying and failing to get medical care.”

In most if not all of these cases, the individual would likely be alive if he hadn’t been put in immigration jail. 

The goal of detention is punishment, not law enforcement compliance

As mentioned before, in other areas of civil law, courts and adjudicators look for ways to bring the individual into compliance with the law they have technically violated. For example, someone who has gotten behind in rent or hasn’t paid the proper amount of taxes would not be jailed for these violations. Courts or agencies would attempt to work out a way forward that is reasonable, achievable, and serves society’s interest. Compliance could be the goal of immigration law too, but it would take a reorientation of policy and law. 

The Trump administration’s immigration policy goal is not compliance with the law. If it were, the administration would not cancel legal status programs to expand the number of people who can be deported. Instead, the goal is to deport as many people as possible — even people who have legal status or paths to compliance under the law.

Incarceration — taking people away from their jobs, businesses, homes, and families — is financially and psychologically draining. And, being detained makes it harder to find and pay for a lawyer, and gather evidence needed to prove cases. People with immigration lawyers are ten times more likely to win their cases — something the Trump administration does not want. 

As is often said when it comes to Trump administration policies, the cruelty is the point. And immigration jail is the cruelty. “Rather than addressing serious public safety threats, the government is spending billions on mass detention to pressure people who pose no threat to give up their cases and accept deportation,” wrote the Council.

Even if an immigrant qualifies for legal status under current law, being detained might lead them to agree to accept deportation and stop pursuing their legal case — because there is no fixed timeframe for their freedom, otherwise.

The real role of immigration jail? Implementing mass deportation

Immigration jail is the bones of the mass deportation beast. Without it, the government would not be able to amass and organize such a large number of people to deport. It is essentially and, in some ways, literally, a warehouse filled with immigrants, while the government prepares the transportation logistics to deport them. 

Lucas County Sheriff Mike Navarre realized this when he was asked to consider supporting an ICE jail contract at the Corrections Center of Northwest Ohio. “I know right from wrong. And separating children from their parents is absolutely the wrong thing to do. It’s been ignored by the federal government. Nobody has a viable solution to what will happen to these children. Until they figure it out, I will not support mass deportations,” he said.

Across Ohio, five county jails (Seneca, Geauga, Butler, Mahoning, and CCNO) and one federal prison (Northeast Ohio Correctional Center) detain immigrants for ICE, with a daily capacity of approximately 1,500. A list of counties and municipalities who have formalized agreements to work with ICE — either detaining immigrants, arresting immigrants, or both — is available here. Many agencies in Ohio also participate in civil immigration law enforcement without having a 287(g) agreement in place, an act that exposes them to lawsuits. 

What should be done, instead?

“Instead of giving ICE a blank check for detention and deportation, Members of Congress should oppose its funding. Limiting funding for ICE will force the agency to prioritize how it uses its resources,” said Tramonte.

“The agency should also be required to change how detention operates, in light of the growing number of deaths, and banned from making warrantless arrests or wearing masks. No one should die over a civil law dispute, yet we are seeing immigration agents shoot and choke people, both in the community and behind cell walls. And no one should be racially profiled, or arrested by someone wearing a mask. If we cannot identify the agency arresting us, how do we know we are being arrested, rather than kidnapped?

“Some Members of Congress are expressing concern over ICE’s actions in Ohio. Concern is welcome, but a commitment to cutting ICE funding is needed. We’ve seen that ICE agents will stop short of nothing to carry out mass deportation — up to and including murder. They are enforcing civil laws with death penalty-sized tools. The question for Ohio Members of Congress and sheriffs is whether they want to fund and participate in this destruction of Ohio families. Otherwise, they should dismantle ICE detention, end local partnerships to enforce civil laws, and support immigration legal reform that values human lives,” Tramonte concluded.  

Resources

• “Immigration Detention Expansion in Trump’s Second Term” (American Immigration Council)

• Primer on Immigration Jail in Ohio (Ohio Immigrant Alliance)

• List of Ohio law enforcement agencies with ICE contracts (Ohio Immigrant Alliance)

• A New Paradigm for Humane and Effective Immigration Enforcement (Peter Markowitz/Center for American Progress)

• “ICE detainees raise alarm over medical care, sheriff refutes claims” (Spectrum News)

• Immigration Detention: A Legal Overview (Congressional Research Service)

• “2025 was ICE’s deadliest year in two decades. Here are the 32 people who died in custody” (The Guardian)