UNCOVERING THE TRUTH:
Violence and Abuse Against Black Migrants in Immigration Detention

The findings of this report illustrate the systemic abuse of Black migrants in immigration detention, an incarceration system rooted in anti-Black racism. To end the ongoing abuse and dehumanization of Black migrants, we must end detention and build a world where all people can live in freedom and dignity.

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report SUMMARY

Drawing on nearly 17,000 call records from FFI’s National Immigration Detention Hotline spanning a six year period, this first-of-its-kind study illustrates the pervasive and systemic anti-Black racism inherent to immigration detention.

This abuse is no accident. In fact, immigration detention has expanded and further entrenched the racist mass incarceration system, carrying on the U.S. legacy of white supremacy that can be traced back through history—from enslavement, to Jim Crow, to mass incarceration, and now, detention. 

Despite this systemic abuse, Black migrants continue to resist, speak out against ICE’s mistreatment, and advocate for their freedom. The report documents several examples of resistance across detention facilities in the South, where a lasting legacy of Black and Indigenous-led movements and resistance in the South persist, oftentimes in the same jails and prisons constructed in the eras of Jim Crow, forced penal labor, and mass incarceration. 

This study’s findings affirm the truth that Black people in detention have always spoken, and add to the growing body of evidence documenting the pattern of vile, anti-Black racism and violence perpetrated inside immigration detention. It’s utterly clear that detention can’t be fixed. It must be abolished. 

KEY FINDINGS

The findings of this study illustrate a disturbing pattern of abuse perpetrated against Black migrants by ICE, private detention contractors, and officials at contracting jails. Key findings include: 

• 28 percent of all abuse-related reports made to the FFI hotline come from Black migrants, despite accounting for only only six percent of the total ICE detention population; 

• In detention facilities in Alabama, Georgia and Louisiana, Black migrants are almost twice as likely to experience abuse inside detention compared to non-Black migrants; 

• Black non-binary migrants are 3.5 times more likely to experience abuse in immigration detention;

• A new FOIA request corroborated a previous study that found that 24 percent of all people in solitary confinement were Black, despite Black migrants accounting for only four percent of the total ICE detention population from 2012-2017; 

• Over 53 percent of the most high-intensity and life-threatening cases that FFI intervened on in the six year period were on behalf of Black migrants. 

SUMMARY OF Recommendations

The only true solution to end the systemic abuse and dehumanization of Black migrants is to end immigration detention. In the meantime, we recommend the Biden administration publicly recognize and condemn the rampant abuse of Black migrants in detention and use its discretion to release Black migrants to allow them to resolve their immigration proceedings from the safety of their families and communities. Among additional administrative, legislative, humanitarian, and state-level strategies, we recommend:

• A federal investigation and oversight hearing on the human rights abuses against Black migrants;

• The collection of ethnic and racial data of those held in custody;

• Adoption of a Trans Policy Memo to end the deportation of trans migrants living with HIV;

• A comprehensive shift from mass incarceration and into community-based support, with Congress divesting funds from immigration detention and enforcement and instead funding programs that provide legal and other humanitarian support to migrants;

• Legislative action to repeal racist immigration laws and pass new legislation that addresses the disparities and inequitable outcomes faced by Black migrants, including those caught up in the unfair and racist criminal legal system;

• At the state level, institute policies that address the over-policing and criminalization of Black communities and end collaboration programs between ICE and local law enforcement that create a pipeline from arrest to deportation and disproportionately affect Black individuals. 

ADDITIONAL BACKGROUND AND CONTEXT

The study’s findings add to the growing body of evidence of anti-Black racism in detention, which has previously been documented in past reports, civil rights complaints, and memos to DHS published or filed by Black-led groups and other immigrants rights groups. The internal organizing and advocacy work of detained Black migrants has been critical to establishing this pattern of racism and disparate treatment. 

The detainment of Black immigrants stems from a long legacy of violence, control, and abuse of Black people in the United States. In recent decades, the immigration detention system has served to further entrench the mass incarceration and criminalization of Black people. 

Like all Black people in the U.S., Black immigrants are stopped, searched and arrested at higher rates than non-Black immigrants, and are over-represented from sentencing to prison. Black immigrants are disproportionately represented among detained immigrants facing deportation in immigration court on criminal grounds, and 76 percent of Black immigrants who are deported have prior contact with the police and the criminal legal system. 

Concerningly, data on the total number of Black people in ICE detention is virtually nonexistent since the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and ICE do not gather racial demographic data and do not provide any public information about its data collection practices regarding race, a practice that is standard among governmental agencies and law enforcement. This effectively obscures and invisibilizes anti-Black abuse in ICE custody. 

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