Content warning: This story contains descriptions of pregnancy loss, medical neglect, and abuse that some readers may find distressing.
When the country’s immigration process is engulfed in cruelty and chaos, what happens to the most vulnerable populations detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)? It’s a question that a growing number of civil and human rights organizations are demanding ICE (now America’s highest-funded law enforcement agency) answer as news emerges of how many pregnant, postpartum, and nursing immigrants are in detention against existing federal policy.
“Our interviews indicate that ICE has issued detainers, arrested, and taken pregnant individuals into custody, even after they have informed officers of their pregnancy, in violation of agency guidance,” the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana, National Immigration Project, Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights, Sanctuary of the South, and Sanctuary Now Abolition Project, write in a joint letter to ICE leadership.
The groups are demanding ICE “identify and release all pregnant women in custody” and “refrain from detaining anyone known to be pregnant, postpartum or nursing.” They say that pregnant women have reported miscarrying or bleeding out while in detention. In their letter, they spotlight the stories of six women detained at ICE processing centers in Basile, Louisiana, and Lumpkin, Georgia.
Lucia (names changed to protect identity) was two months pregnant when ICE detained her at a regular check-in. When she started to bleed heavily later that evening, Lucia asked for medical attention but instead was taken to a room with no food, water, or pain medication. That’s where she bled alone for several hours. When she was finally taken to the emergency room, Lucia stayed shackled while actively losing her pregnancy. By the time she got to the hospital, she needed a blood transfusion from the miscarriage.
The ACLU also tells us the story of Marie, who developed eclampsia, a life-threatening condition, after being released from detention. Marie experienced complications with her delivery and says that she continues to suffer from postpartum depression related to her detention trauma.
These are the accounts of just two pregnant women in detention — can you imagine the reports of horror we don’t know?
“The stories that are represented in this letter are just the tip of the iceberg,” Eunice Cho, senior counsel at the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Prison Project, said to NBC News. “You have women who are talking about being shackled and restrained while they’re actively miscarrying; you have women begging and pleading for things as basic as prenatal vitamins and being denied.” Cho said that the groups heard multiple stories of women losing their pregnancies in detention and not getting proper medical care. “Those stories, I think, really are some of the most chilling stories I’ve heard about detention.”
While you may not have been aware, this isn’t a new issue. Immigration advocates and political leaders have been sounding the alarm about pregnant women in detention throughout the year. In July, U.S. Senator Jon Ossoff’s office launched an investigation into human rights abuses in immigration detention that found 14 reports of mistreatment of pregnant women. It goes on to say that “reported or confirmed events to date include deaths in custody, physical and sexual abuse, mistreatment of pregnant women, mistreatment of children, inadequate medical care, overcrowding and unsanitary living conditions, inadequate food or water, exposure to extreme temperatures, denial of access to attorneys, and family separations.”
ICE refuted these allegations: “Pregnant women receive regular prenatal visits, mental health services, nutritional support, and accommodations aligned with community standards of care. Detention of pregnant women is rare and has elevated oversight and review. No pregnant woman has been forced to sleep on the floor.” Assistant secretary for public affairs at the Department of Homeland Security Tricia McLaughlin also weighed in. “Senator Ossoff’s false allegations of subprime conditions have been debunked time and time again by DHS,” she said. “ICE detention facilities have higher standards than most U.S. prisons that detain American citizens. All detainees are provided with comprehensive medical care, proper meals, and are given the opportunity to call their family members and attorneys.”
Regardless of the conditions they’re kept in, pregnant people aren’t even allowed to be detained in most cases. In response to the first Trump administration’s immigration policies, the Biden administration ordered ICE not to detain pregnant, postpartum, or nursing people except in “exceptional circumstances.” According to the 19th News, those who are detained are supposed to be held in facilities suited to appropriate health care, ICE-employed medical professionals are supposed to provide weekly updates on those detainees to relevant agency directors, and the ICE Health Service Corps is supposed to keep consistent records of all pregnant, postpartum and nursing detainees, providing monthly updates to the organization’s leadership.
The investigations and reports coming out of these facilities paint a very different picture, even though Trump has not officially ended Biden’s policy.
This issue demonstrates how for these women of color, immigration, gender, and reproductive justice all intersect.
While ICE assures that pregnant immigrants are getting adequate care, medical professionals warn that general detention center conditions themselves can increase the risk of complications for birthing people, not to mention the stress of limited food, on top of arrest and separation from their families.
The exact number of pregnant detainees is not known. Advocates warn that the Trump Administration has not released the data of pregnant detainees even though ICE Health Service Corps is supposed to keep “consistent records of all pregnant, postpartum and nursing detainees, providing monthly updates to the organization’s leadership.” Experts tell the 19th News that “quantifying the exact number of pregnant, postpartum, or nursing immigrants in custody has become impossible.” Advocates told NBC News that as detention surges across the country, they’ve seen a spike in the number of pregnant women in detention facilities.
We are talking about women and children, and women with children. It’s a compounded experience of additional misery and suffering. You are completely unprotected.
This issue demonstrates how for these women of color, immigration, gender, and reproductive justice all intersect. It reveals how people’s lives are indeed shaped by their identities, race, and socio-economic factors. It all comes together to create a type of oppression that is connected and compounded. In the case of pregnant detainees, we are not only speaking about women and children, who are often the most vulnerable. We are talking about women and children, and women with children. It’s a compounded experience of additional misery and suffering. You are completely unprotected.
But as the country’s ongoing crackdown on immigration continues to intensify, the stories of pregnant women in detention are likely only to increase unless we keep up the pressure and demand otherwise. Pregnant detainees represent not only the dehumanization of the current generation of immigrants, but also the future ones they are carrying.