ICE is hiring dozens of health workers as lawsuits, deaths in custody mount
Source: Politico
10/20/2025 10:00 AM EDT
The Trump administration is expanding its ranks of health care providers who work in immigration detention centers around the country as deaths in custody mount and federal oversight is weakened by layoffs.
The push by the Department of Homeland Security to hire more than 40 doctors, nurses, psychiatrists, pharmacists and health administrators follows the revelation that nearly as many immigrants have died in custody so far this year than over the course of the Biden administration, according to government records.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has reported 20 detainee deaths in custody since President Donald Trump took office — the most in a single year in decades — compared to 24 deaths in the Biden administration. The 2025 figure was provided by the office of Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), the ranking member on the House subcommittee overseeing DHS. The overall death rate is lower given that the number of detained immigrants is at a record high.
The detention centers — which currently hold more than 60,000 people — are overcrowded and the use of hastily constructed facilities like tent cities makes it easier, public health officials said, for communicable diseases to spread and more difficult to manage chronic illnesses. At the same time, oversight of the centers has eroded, as layoffs hit the Homeland Security offices investigating allegations of abuse and neglect, and lawmakers attempting to visit facilities in their districts are turned away.
Read more: https://www.politico.com/news/2025/10/20/ice-is-hiring-dozens-of-health-workers-as-lawsuits-deaths-in-custody-mount-00614485
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