COVID-19 cases in ICE Detention Centers in the US

by Victoria Dmitrieva

Multiple ICE detainees are testing positive in ICE facilities across the country in unsanitary and overcrowded conditions. However, there are indications that ICE might be severely underreporting COVID-19 cases while refusing to release detainees. According to the Vera Institute of Justice, the number of COVID-19 cases could be 15 times higher than what ICE reports. Although there were eight deaths among ICE detainees since the pandemic broke out, the number of people infected is unprecedented – to date there has been 7,583 cases of COVID-19 in ICE Detention centers. ICE started publishing data on COVID-19 in its detention centers in late March, shortly after it reported its first case of COVID-19 among people in custody.

The first chart is line graphs that show how the virus was spreading in ICE Field offices since late March to early December.

Source: U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement

The second chart is a treemap that shows the highest total number of cases to date among ICE facilities since the pandemic started. We can see that facilities in Arizona, Georgia, Texas and Washington had the worst outbreaks compared to the other locations.