Immigration arrests have become more common under the Trump administration, and the financial strain has increased for immigrants in jail.
After someone is arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), they go before an immigration judge to determine if they can be released while they wait for future hearings. If they’re granted bond, and they pay 100 percent, then they can be released from detention.
This process has changed dramatically under the Trump administration, said Lee Vanderlinden, an attorney and co-vice president of the Midwest Immigration Bond Fund. The volunteer-run revolving bond fund has seen prices skyrocket.
“Sometimes, oh my gosh, it'd be $7,500 — that would be a huge amount maybe last year,” Vanderlinden said. “This year, we are frequently seeing $10,000, $15,000.”
The fund has seen requests as high as $50,000, Vanderlinden said. Last week alone, the fund received 12 requests for support, totaling about $100,000.
After an ICE campaign in Chicago last fall called Operation Midway Blitz, Vanderlinden said the demand has jumped.
“We saw an increase in demand for bonds for those folks who were picked up by ICE as well as an increase in support,” Vanderlinden said. “Honestly, people are enraged that our neighbors are being kidnapped, and people are enraged with the actions of ICE. We've seen it with comrades in Indiana as well, that people want justice for our neighbors.”
The minimum immigration bond is $1,500.
Not every person arrested will receive a bond hearing. If someone is eligible for bond, an immigration judge has decided they’re not a danger to the community or a flight risk, said Christie Popp, an attorney and partner at Popp and Bullman.
Under the Trump administration, Popp said very few people are getting bond hearings. If they do, the bonds are typically thousands of dollars.
Attorneys and immigrants have challenged this new bond process in federal court, arguing the U.S. government has unlawfully detained them.
“This has really been a huge change,” Popp said. “If a court says, ‘Well, you're not eligible for bond,’ then you have to sit there. Whether you can pay for it or not, you're stuck there.”
The Trump administration said U.S. officials have “arrested and deported hundreds of thousands of criminal illegal aliens across the country.” ICE and other immigration officials have conducted “hundreds of thousands of arrests,” the Department of Homeland Security said in January.
“Over 3 million illegal aliens are out of the country, as DHS has removed more than 675,000 illegal aliens and estimated 2.2 million illegal aliens have self-deported,” the DHS said.
Immigration matters are heard in civil court, not criminal court, so those arrested aren’t entitled to an attorney at the government’s expense. Because the government doesn’t provide free legal representation, many immigrants don’t have attorneys while facing deportation, Popp said.
“These are not crimes,” Popp said. “We are actually seeing a lot of people who are doing everything right be detained.”
Legal fees are expensive, and Popp said immigrant communities often pool funding. Her clients don’t have much experience with nonprofit funding or crowdsourcing, but she’s heard of well-meaning locals chipping in.
After someone is arrested and detained by immigration officials, they are fast-tracked through removal proceedings, Popp said. That makes finding a lawyer, paying their fees and preparing a case to stay in the U.S. even harder.
Mentally, it takes a toll, she said.
“A lot of people have just kind of given up their cases and left, taken a deportation or a voluntary departure, because they cannot stand to sit in jail,” Popp said.
Distance and time spent detained are other complicating factors, and the costs add up. Some midwestern immigrants could be transported as far as El Paso, Texas, or to a rural detention center in Michigan.
“If you're sitting in a jail in Texas, I don't know how I would be able to pay my rent if I was in that situation,” Vanderlinden said. “We're talking about the cascade of effects of plucking people away from their homes.”
People in detention need to figure out how to get home, too, Vanderlinden said. After a bond is paid, ICE releases people where they were detained — sometimes hundreds of miles from their homes.
“I was working with a community member who was arrested in Minneapolis and then transferred to Texas, and we were able to post his bond,” Vanderlinden said. “But then the community rallied. People were donating airline miles, trying to figure out what ID this person had. Could they get on a plane? Could they get through TSA? These are amazing reminders of the power of the people.”
