Beyond the Border: Sexual violence allegations, a resignation and the end of detention oversight

Here's what happened this week in immigration news.

Written by Kate Morrissey, Edited by Sam Barney-Gibbs and Lauren J. Mapp

Welcome to another edition of Beyond the Border, which summarizes immigration news from across the country in a weekly roundup. Did I miss something? Message me via kate@daylightsandiego.org or on Instagram.

Want to support this work? Consider donating to Daylight San Diego or email maya@daylightsandiego.org if you're interested in sponsoring this newsletter.

Alliance San Diego and the Southern Border Communities Coalition sent a letter to Congress this week revealing allegations of sexual violence against more than 170 agents and officers in Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection, I reported for Daylight San Diego. Journalist John Carlos Frey spearheaded the research that led to the letter, and he released a podcast about it on the same day.

The Washington Examiner reported that Border Patrol Chief Michael Banks resigned suddenly following the allegations. His name appeared on the letter’s list after the outlet previously reported that he had bragged to colleagues repeatedly about traveling abroad to pay for sex.

Immigration custody conditions

The Department of Homeland Security shut down the Office of Immigration Detention Ombudsman, which investigates deaths in custody, NPR reported.

LAist found that the Trump administration has greatly increased the use of solitary confinement on people in immigration custody. 

An Indian woman who worked as a court translator was freed after 45 days in ICE custody, CBS News reported. She told the outlet, “No one is safe.”

The Dallas Morning News wrote about a woman who found out she was pregnant in ICE custody and later miscarried.

I reported for Capital & Main that a Salvadoran man said he had a stroke while in ICE custody shortly before he believed he would be deported to Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo, or CECOT, a prison where other deportees have been tortured.

Reps. Sara Jacobs and Mike Levin inspected Otay Mesa Detention Center unannounced, but ICE issued a new memo that prevented them from speaking with detainees, inewsource reported. A federal judge had ruled that ICE has to give lawmakers access to inspect its facilities.

The Washington Post posted a video interview on Instagram with an 85-year-old French woman and widow of a U.S. servicemember who was held in ICE custody. The woman said her husband had been pro-Trump before he died, but her experiences at the detention facility changed her own opinions, and she called for the release of women whom she met inside.

Federal court updates

A federal judge dropped conspiracy charges against four protesters in Chicago who'd been facing the felony charges after demonstrating outside an ICE facility, the Chicago Sun-Times reported.

A federal judge in Washington, D.C. found that ICE had violated her order limiting officers’ ability to make arrests without warrants, The New York Times reported.

MPR News reported that prosecutors have dropped the cases against a third of the protesters arrested and charged in Minneapolis.

Surveillance, raids and use-of-force

WIRED published a video on YouTube about how it identified immigration officials who had used excessive force during recent raids.

The head of ICE acknowledged that the agency is using an Israeli company's spyware that has a “no click” capability to read encrypted messages on phones, NPR reported. That means the spyware can infect your phone even if you don't click any suspicious-looking links.

404 Media reported that ICE has a list of 20 million people the agency is trying to deport thanks to surveillance technology from data software company Palantir.

BreakThrough Newsroom reported in a video on Instagram that federal agents raided the homes of several activists with community watch group VC Defensa in Ventura County, California.

Living in hiding

The BBC profiled a Somali man in Minnesota who is living in hiding because of fears about ICE.

ICE deported a Detroit man to Iraq even though he said he doesn't have citizenship there, the Detroit Free Press reported. Now the man is living in hiding. 

Mass deportations

Tom Homan, the Trump administration's “border czar,” said mass deportations are coming in higher numbers later this year, NPR reported.

Nine months after members of San Diego's Congressional delegation asked for data on deportations from the region, ICE finally responded, The San Diego Union-Tribune reported. The outlet wrote that  ICE removed about 16,400 people and arrested 10,500 in San Diego and Imperial counties during the first 14 months of President Donald Trump’s second term.

Under the Trump administration, nine in 10 of the people deported by ICE were men, and a quarter of them had lived in the U.S. for at least three years, The Washington Post reported. The outlet noted the strain that losing fathers to deportation has had on many households across the country.

Driving without a license is the most common offense for people with criminal histories in ICE custody, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported. Many states don't allow undocumented people to get driver’s licenses. 

Other stories to watch

The Washington Post reported that the Trump administration has selected a former private prison executive to lead ICE.

On three separate occasions, ICE has detained the same U.S. citizen who works at construction sites in Alabama, AL.com reported.

Two former immigration judges sued the Trump administration for firing them, ABC News reported.

A U.S. citizen teen died from cancer the day after reuniting with his deported parents in Mexico, Telemundo reported. 

The Trump administration announced that it did not participate in a U.N. migration forum and would not join the global organization's declaration, Reuters reported. The administration's statement included references to the racist Great Replacement Theory.

The federal government fast-tracked the immigration case of Mahmoud Khalil, the first noncitizen activist arrested by the Trump administration, The Guardian reported. His attorney called the proceedings “a preordained and complete sham.”

Los Angeles volunteers who observe immigration court proceedings issued a report condemning the lack of due process, L.A. Public Press reported.

Thanks for reading! Take care and stay well.

— Kate