Policy: ICE And The Pregnant Women It's Detaining

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0:25Immigration and customs enforcement arrests reached record highs this summer, and the full scope is just coming into focus. 43 ,000 people were arrested in June, more than 49 ,000 in July, and almost 51 ,000 in August, an agency record. Also in June, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives passed a$70 billion package to fund ICE and Border Patrol through the end of President Donald Trump's term. As ICE became the best-funded law enforcement agency in the country, its tactics changed. Instead of high-profile operations centralized in one location, like operations in Minnesota, Chicago, and Los Angeles last year, they're focusing on quieter, everyday arrests throughout the country.

1:09At his Senate confirmation hearing in March, new Secretary of Homeland Security Mark Wayne Mullen described the approach the department would take under his leadership. My goal in six months is that we're not in the lead story every single day. My goal is for people to understand we're out there, we're protecting them, and we're working with them. I'm Jen White. You're listening to the 1A Podcast. Just ahead, we talk about what has changed in six months and what we know about the surge in ICE arrests. Stay with us.

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2:32This message comes from Midi Health. Most women never get real answers about their hormonal health. Midi is changing that with virtual care covered by most major insurances. Understand your hormones. Visit JoinMidi.com to book your first visit today. Welcome back to the 1A podcast. We're talking about ICE and the record number of arrests this summer. Joining us is Nick Miroff. He's a staff writer covering immigration at The Atlantic. Nick, welcome back. Hi, Jen. It's good to be with you again. So many of us remember less than a year ago the protests over Operation Metro surge in Minnesota, the images of ICE officers led by Greg Bovino, the former commander-at-large of the Border Patrol, you know, walking city streets.

3:14That isn't happening anymore, but ICE arrests have increased. Where are those arrests taking place now? Well, I mean, they're happening all over the country as, you know, the strategy that was laid out after Minneapolis, you know, has come to fruition for ICE essentially. They now have the resources, the personnel, you know, the means to conduct a deportation campaign of this kind because they have so much more money. And they don't need to make as much noise as they were making when they were last year, when they were in, you know, in these cities. And so they're able to increase their arrest numbers, really, all around the country at the same time.

3:59Now, as of this month, local law enforcement is signing nearly 2 ,600 agreements with ICE to collaborate on immigration enforcement. These are called 287G agreements. What do they allow local law enforcement to do? They essentially enlist local police departments, sheriff's departments in helping ICE boost its arrest numbers. They can be of a more limited kind, focusing on people who are in county jails and so forth. But the most aggressive form of these partnerships essentially deputizes police officers and sheriff's deputies to go out and help ICE kind of run checks on people that they encounter in the course of their patrol duties.

4:49So getting pulled over for a traffic violation can ultimately help ICE make an arrest that would lead to a deportation. Right. ICE traffic stops got a huge amount of attention earlier in the year, especially after several ended in fatal shootings like those we saw in Houston and Bidford, Maine. Those shootings caused ICE to briefly pause traffic stops, and that move was quickly reversed by President Trump. What role are traffic stops playing in this increase in arrests? They're playing a huge role and they've really become, you know, one of the primary ways in which ICE is taking more people into custody and is able to reach these kind of record highs in terms of arrests.

5:31And the way they're able to do that is by, you know, using some of the technology and some of the, you know, the kind of expanded access to different databases that they have gained under this administration. And so they can, you know, run license plates, they can quickly scan, you know, documents, driver's licenses, that type of thing. And they're able to, you know, kind of increase the number of potential targets that they can find. They don't have to go to people's houses as much, you know, where their tactic of, you know, kind of knocking on someone's door was, you know, giving them diminishing returns.

6:14they found that this is the fastest way for their officers to go out and maximize the number of arrests that they can make but i'll say that it's a very um you know these are these are very dangerous uh and fraught encounters because you know people who are are getting pulled over you know this is a potentially life-altering traffic stop for them if they end up getting deported and that's why you're seeing some drivers panic and and and that's that's behind some of the violence that we've seen. What sorts of goals has Secretary Mullen set for the number of arrests they want to make under his leadership?

6:54Well, I think it's important to keep in mind that Secretary Mullen is, you know, even though he's the Secretary of Homeland Security, he isn't the only person driving this train. These priorities are being set by Stephen Miller in the White House with his team there and are being carried out by Mullen as well as the other senior officials at ICE. And they have backed off from the 3 ,000 a day arrest quota that Stephen Miller and Kristi Noem originally set out last spring, started in the spring of 2025. But they are still pushing officers to make as many arrests as possible I think their goal, the goal that they have stated is a million deportations a year.

7:42And they're still not close to that, but they're a lot closer than they were last year. And they have the resources now and the personnel to actually make that kind of a feasible target. And is it clear who they're prioritizing for removal from the country? Well, they play a lot of semantic games with the way they are conducting this operation. And if you see, you know, border czar Tom Homan on television, he'll say that the priority remains people with criminal backgrounds, you know, gang members, that type of thing. But, you know, we know from looking at the statistic that that's, that, you know, the people with, you know, violent criminal convictions amount to fewer than 10 % of the people they're arresting and deporting.

8:25And a lot of the people who they are defining as criminals are people whose criminal backgrounds are mostly immigration violations or moving violations or things that are nonviolent offenses. At the same time, you know, Homan's line is always that people who are, that everyone is on the table and that they're not going to, you know, decline to take someone into custody if they're in the country illegally. So what ICE calls collateral arrests remain a huge part of the percentage of people that they're taking into custody. And those are the people who, if they're traveling in the car with someone that they're targeting, they will take them into custody and so forth.

9:04But that's why we're hearing about so many people who have lived in the United States for many, many years without a criminal record being taken by ICE and deported from the United States. Do the detention facilities we currently have in the U.S. have the capacity to house people as the number of arrests continues to tick up? They're running into detention space issues again. Last year, Kristi Noem and her top aide, Corey Lewandowski, set an aggressive strategy to expand ICE detention capacity by buying, you know, empty warehouses and planning to convert them into ice jails. They spent more than a billion dollars on that, but they've really backed off that strategy.

9:54And while they're opening some new facilities, they're mostly been relying on expanding places where ice already holds people. That continues to be a big, you know, a big part of their strategy, but they are running out of space, particularly in certain regions like the Northeast, the West Coast, where, you know, blue states have made it harder for ICE to expand, you know, its detention infrastructure. But they are finding ways to hold people. They've gotten more efficient about deporting people faster. And so I don't get the sense that this is, you know, really a big limitation on their ability to meet their targets.

10:36I want to briefly talk about how these immigration tactics are being tracked. Arrest data is released by ICE on its public website. But as you recently reported, a top expert at DHS, Mark Rosenblum, retired out of frustration in July. He was the creator of the Office of Homeland Security Statistics. Why did he resign and what does his absence mean for the availability of accurate data shared by DHS? us? Well, for the longest time, I mean, the lawmakers from both parties and the broader public were eager for DHS and immigration enforcement statistics that weren't filtered through political messaging.

11:15And this office was created during the last administration to be a kind of neutral storehouse for this type of information that is in such demand. What is ICE doing? What is the Border Patrol doing? Who are they taking into custody? That type of thing. And so this office was created. It was funded very eagerly by lawmakers of both parties, but essentially muzzled when the Trump administration came in. And Mark Rosenblum, the director, who wasn't able to release any public reports after about a year of that, He resigned. And that office has really been hamstrung and is no longer able to produce timely, regular information the way that it used to.

12:07And so what does that mean for the public's understanding and lawmakers' understanding of what's happening in immigration enforcement? It means a lot of it is coming out in DHS social media posts or in claims by administration officials that are very difficult to verify. Well, that's Nick Muroff. He's a staff writer covering immigration at The Atlantic. Nick, thank you. Thank you, Jen. Coming up, Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested a record number of pregnant women last fall and winter. What do we know about the conditions they experienced? That's just a hat.

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14:03Shop plans at MintMobile.com slash switch. Taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details. Welcome back to the 1A Podcast. More details are being released about a record number of immigration and customs enforcement arrests of pregnant women beginning last fall. A September report by The Guardian revealed that ICE placed more pregnant immigrants in detention last fall and winter than at any time over the previous year. ICE data from February reveals that 86 pregnant women were in ICE custody. More than 10 percent were detained in their third trimester. And nearly 400 women who were pregnant, postpartum, or nursing were deported from January 2025 to February 2026.

14:46That's according to the Department of Homeland Security. Previous reports show that ICE booked 347 pregnant, postpartum, or nursing people in 2023 and 375 in 2022. Most of those people were released or paroled, not deported. ICE and the Department of Homeland Security say pregnant women make up a fraction of detainees. A DHS spokesperson sent us a statement. It says, in part, quote, pregnancy in ICE detention is exceedingly rare, making up 0.15 percent of all illegal aliens currently in custody as of August 31st, end quote. But the latest numbers have raised questions as ICE is already drawing criticism for the medical attention these detainees receive.

15:28Today, we'll get into how pregnant women are being affected by the Trump administration's mass deportation campaign. And for women who haven't been arrested or detained, how is fear of immigration enforcement affecting their medical care? Joining us now in studio is Zane Lakhani. She's the Director of Migrant Rights and Justice at the Women's Refugee Commission. Zane, welcome to the program. Thank you for having me. Shefali Luthra is a reproductive health reporter at The 19th News. She joins us now. Shefali, welcome back to the program. Thanks for having me. And Dr. Ghazale Moyadi is an OBGYN in Texas.

16:00She's also a board chair with Physicians for Reproductive Health. Dr. Moyadi, welcome. Thank you so much. We would also love to hear from you. If concerns of immigration enforcement have kept you from seeking prenatal or postpartum care, share your story. Email us at 1a at wamu.org. Shefali and ICE policy from 2021 says pregnant, postpartum, and nursing women should not be arrested by ICE, quote, unless release is prohibited by law or exceptional circumstances exist. So what reasoning is ICE giving about the pregnant women they have arrested and detained? It's such a good question. And basically what we have heard is what you referenced earlier.

16:42ICE says that pregnant postpartum nursing detainees make up a tiny fraction of the people they are detaining. They say that they are targeting people who are violent criminals, who are threats. And that just simply isn't true. We have spoken to countless women who have been detained while pregnant, postpartum, or nursing who didn't have criminal records. Or if they did, they had traffic violations. Very, very minor. Very different from what has been described. And to the point you made earlier, the numbers really do indicate that we are seeing people detained in these numbers and deported that aren't reflective of what we had in previous administrations.

17:26And so I think this is really important is that technically, formally, the policy that was in place under previous administrations was not technically reversed. However, in practice, this is what we are seeing. And what we know, as you referenced, is detention centers are often not safe for people who are pregnant or postpartum or nursing. They have complex particular medical needs. They are medically vulnerable. They need more health care. And very often what we have heard from these women and their attorneys and medical providers is they simply aren't getting the attention they need. Well, the latest figures from ICE on the number of pregnant women detained are from February of 2026, and those say 86 women in custody.

18:15Do we have updated numbers? We do not. And that's also very important because under previous administrations, there was a policy that twice a year, the Department of Homeland Security would put out a report. And they would say, these are the number of pregnant, postpartum, and nursing people who are detained. This is the justification for why they have been detained. And this allowed at least some transparency into who was being taken into detention facilities, why, what the rationale was. Congress let that requirement lapse. And so as a result, we don't get the regular reporting that we used to have.

18:54The numbers you referenced were only provided in response to a specific request from a Democratic Senator, Patty Murray. Otherwise, we may not even have that level of information. Saying that your organization, the Women's Refugee Commission, you've launched a detention pregnancy tracker. Why do you feel like it's important to track the number of pregnant women in detention? And how are you tracking them? That's an excellent question. And I want to pick up on a little bit of what Shefali said about some of the lack of reporting requirements and how some of those have disappeared. So the Women's Refugee Commission's approach to trying to understand what was happening to pregnant, postpartum, and nursing women in detention was in part in response to both this significant uptick of these women going into detention facilities that we were seeing starting last spring and also the lack of information that was coming out of the administration, including information that was previously available.

19:47So the lack of this reporting requirement, also our inability to get into detention centers to speak with women and understand what was happening to them. So the Detention Pregnancy Tracker, detentionpregnancytracker.com, was one key strategy to try to understand not only how many women were in detention, but also understand their experience, their treatment, their care, what was happening to them behind those detention center doors, that kind of black box that immigration detention has become. We also worked with senators like Senator Patty Murray to write data requests to be able to get some of the information from February that you cited.

20:22We also traveled to reception centers across Central America or Mexico to speak directly with women who have been deported to learn about their experiences in detention. We've also, you know, we're working on other data requests, filed FOIA requests, working with other members of Congress. So it's really a wraparound effort to try to crack this black box and to get the information. What have you learned? So a lot of what we have learned really echoes some of what Shefali was talking about, that many of the women in immigration custody who are pregnant or nursing are not receiving the kind of medical care that they urgently require.

20:56They're not receiving the kind of nutrition that they urgently require to sustain healthy pregnancies. And just as importantly, they are not getting the kind of oversight and monitoring that is necessary to ensure that they can safely carry their pregnancies and be safe. You know, for many women, pregnancy is a time of great joy, but also great danger and great vulnerability. If you have a high-risk pregnancy complication or are vulnerable to pregnancy complication, that can turn dangerous or life-threatening very quickly. And we have many examples of women who either have high-risk pregnancies that are not monitored or experience life-threatening pregnancy complications that are simply ignored.

21:35And really briefly, do you have an updated number of women who are being detained? We have that number from February, but anything between then and now? So we do not have any updated data from ICE. And we are working, you know, sort of on multiple different fronts to try to get that updated data. But no, and I want to say like that number, that 86 number, that was a point in time number. That was the number that they were saying on that day there were that many women, right? But there's going to be more or less at any point in time. So if you imagine 86 people on one given day, the number of people over the course of the 18 months of this administration is going to look significantly higher.

22:10Well, a DHS spokesperson sent us this statement about the level of care pregnant detainees receive. It reads, quote, pregnant women receive regular prenatal visits, mental health services, nutritional support, and accommodations aligned with community standards of care. It goes on to say, quote, this is the best health care many of these individuals have received in their entire lives. Dr. Muglietti, does that align with what you understand is happening within detention centers? Absolutely not. It does not align at all with the reality of what we are seeing across detention centers in this country.

22:43What are you seeing? Give us more detail. You know, what we are seeing and what's being reported is people are being denied surveillance, proper surveillance within their pregnancies. They're being denied proper nutrition. They are being treated inhumanely. They are being placed in solitary confinement. They are being shackled, which even the American College of OBGYN says is medically dangerous. We are seeing people being denied miscarriage care, being left in cells for days bleeding. So it is not the reality that this is the best health care that people have experienced at all. Shefali, Zane referred to the detention centers as a black box.

23:25It's difficult to get information. What kind of oversight is there at this moment into the type of care that is being provided to people who are in detention? It's truly so limited. Everything we have been able to learn personally covering this since the start of this administration has been from speaking directly to women who were detained, to their lawyers, to combing through lawsuits, GoFundMes, whatever resources we can find. because the oversight, the transparency, just it simply isn't there. There isn't a clear way for people to understand what is happening. Access to these detention centers, as Zane mentioned, is very, very limited.

24:09We have spoken with some lawmakers who have been able to have these brief visits where they can go meet someone who was detained and learn a little bit about their experience, but that is also simply a snapshot in time. And I have spoken personally to women who cannot get their medical records, and that also is deeply concerning. They are legally entitled to their medical records of whatever care they receive in pregnancy while they are detained. What complications possibly emerge? I mean, I keep thinking of one woman. She was released after months of detention, transferred from facility to facility.

24:45After she was released, she learned she had preeclampsia and gestational diabetes, medical complications that can make pregnancy more dangerous, but should be caught and taken care of early in pregnancy. And she was never able to get those records from when she was detained to find out what care, if any, she had been given when these conditions might have even developed in her pregnancy. Dr. Molletti, help us understand a bit more about some of the medical risks women who are in detention may face in relationship to a pregnancy. You mentioned being held in shackles and that being an issue. But just more generally, being in those conditions, what issues might that cause?

25:32Yes. So certainly being detained and being in those conditions can increase perinatal mental health conditions. So what we're seeing is people are reporting PTSD, an increase in depression and anxiety when they are released. But this black box is certainly true that my patients disappear and never come back. And so it's a black box not only for what we know, but truly for human disappearance as well. With things like miscarriage, right, someone being left alone bleeding for days, people are being denied the basic human right to an intervention in a miscarriage. All people should be offered pills to manage their miscarriage or an immediate procedure, but rather are being placed alone in rooms with very little nutrition or water and then bleeding on their own.

26:28And, you know, we have seen outside of pregnancy just last week, a man was shot by ICE in Austin in the hospital for very short amount of time and discharged to ICE with a bullet. And so we see that everyone is being treated inhumanely and not to medical standards within ICE detention. We got this email from Dennis who says, why would a person at such a vulnerable moment attempt to cross a border, whether through a legal process or without authorization? What kinds of pressures or circumstances drive that decision? And Zaina, I think it would be helpful here to just maybe explain a little bit about who's being detained, where they may be in an immigration process if they're in the country going through a process?

27:13That's a great question. And I want to respond, you know, specifically to the kinds of women who are subject to enforcement and detention largely. So unlike, you know, many times in the past where the majority of immigration enforcement were people who had recently crossed the border and were being detained by Customs and Border Protection, the overwhelming amount of immigration arrests that we are seeing now are people who are inside the country, living in the interior of the country, who have lived here for years or even decades. And many of the people, you know, that we have worked with and that we are seeing pulled into immigration enforcement do also have lawful reasons to be here.