CALIFORNIA CITY, Calif. — Mega prison corporation CoreCivic is detaining people in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the U.S. Marshals Service at the California City Correctional Facility despite its failure to comply with California law and obtain the required city permits. City officials previously alerted CoreCivic that the city found serious safety concerns at the prison, including a failed fire department inspection, and that the facility could not legally operate in the city. 

NEW ORLEANS — Following the Trump administration’s announcement that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) will begin detaining people at the notorious Louisiana State Penitentiary as a tactic to force people to give up on their immigration cases, Laura Hernández, executive director of Freedom for Immigrants, issued the following statement.

Trump’s spending and anti-immigration bill slashes tens of billions of dollars from health care, food assistance, education programs, and other vital services to provide a staggering $150 billion for immigration enforcement and makes Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) the largest law enforcement agency in the United States.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Amid another series of preventable deaths in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention, a record-high daily detention population number, and Trump and Congress’ push to drastically increase ICE’s detention budget by $45 billion, or 13 times the current funding level, Laura Hernández, executive director of Freedom for Immigrants, issued the following statement.

LOS ANGELES — Freedom for Immigrants (FFI) today launched Project Keep Away, an initiative devoted to preventing prison-to-immigration detention transfers by empowering  community members both inside and outside of prisons with educational resources and programming as well as a live, free helpline available to people inside two California prisons. 

WASHINGTON, D.C. — As advocates across the country take to the streets today for the Communities Not Cages National Day of Action, anchored by Detention Watch Network, Freedom for Immigrants (FFI) joins those detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in demanding the immediate release of community members and an end to the Trump administration's reckless expansion of mass detention and deportations. Nearly 48,000 people are now in ICE custody, the highest number since 2019. 

NEW YORK — Following Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) arrest and detainment of Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian activist and legal permanent resident at Columbia, Freedom for Immigrants executive director Laura Hernández released the following statement.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — In response to President Trump’s anticipated signing of the Laken Riley Act into law today, and a slew of recent executive orders that seek to scapegoat, detain, and deport immigrants through extremist criminalizing policies and immigration detention expansion, Laura Hernández, executive director of Freedom for Immigrants, issued the following statement.