Among the flurry of immigration-related executive
orders marking the second presidential administration of Donald Trump is
Executive Order 14159, establishing the policy of detaining individuals apprehended on suspicion of violating immigration laws for the duration of their removal proceedings “to the extent permitted by law.” President Trump’s call for mass deportations was matched by a
surge in immigration detention nationally. In line with this policy, Trump issued
dozens of other immigration-related executive orders and executive actions and signed into law the
Laken Riley Act as part of a broader rollback of immigrants’ rights in the United States.
Within a month of the inauguration, the number of people detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) began increasing. Throughout 2024, an average of 37,500 people were
detained in immigration detention in the US per day.
[1] As of June 20, 2025, on any given day, over 56,000 people were in detention across the country, 40 percent more than in June 2024, and the
highest detention population in the
history of US immigration detention. As of
June 15, immigration detention numbers were at an average of 56,400 per day, and nearly 72 percent of individuals detained had no criminal history.
Between January and June 2025, thousands were held in immigration detention at the Krome North Service Processing Center (Krome), the Broward Transitional Center (BTC), and the Federal Detention Center (FDC), in Florida, under conditions that flagrantly violate international human rights standards and the United States government’s own immigration detention standards. By March, the number of people in immigration detention at Krome had increased 249 percent from the levels before the January inauguration. At times in March, the facility detained more than three times its operational
capacity of inmates. As of June 20, 2025, the number of people in immigration detention at the three facilities was at 111 percent from the levels before the inauguration.
The change was qualitative as well as quantitative. Detainees in three Florida facilities told Human Rights Watch that ICE detention officers and private contractor guards treated them in a degrading and dehumanizing manner. Some were detained shackled for prolonged periods on buses without food, water, or functioning toilets; there was extreme overcrowding in freezing holding cells where detainees were forced to sleep on cold concrete floors under constant fluorescent lighting; and many were denied access to basic hygiene and medical care.
