Immigration and Customs Enforcement is racing to fill dozens of healthcare jobs after a spike in deaths among detainees and mounting lawsuits accusing the agency of medical neglect.
As of Monday, at least 45 open positions were listed online for ICE’s Health Service Corps, including doctors, nurses, pharmacists, and even data scientists. The listings range from dental hygienists to psychiatric nurse practitioners and medical risk managers.
One ad for a traveling physician said the role “provides direct patient care during ICE removal missions and DHS operations, including emergency response and medical oversight in austere environments.” Another posting described a psychiatric provider position as one that “delivers psychiatric care to ICE detainees, including evaluations, treatment plans, medication management, and crisis intervention.”
The hiring push, first reported by Politico, follows a wave of lawsuits that accuse ICE of failing to give detainees proper medical care. Many migrants are being housed in hastily built facilities as the agency scrambles to keep up with former President Donald Trump’s renewed mass deportation drive.
Last week, Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington, the top Democrat on the House subcommittee that oversees ICE, said 20 people have died in ICE custody since Trump returned to office. That’s nearly as many as during the entire Biden presidency, although the total number of detainees is far higher now.
Experts warn that the dramatic increase in detentions has worsened already dangerous conditions. ICE detention centers have faced years of complaints over sexual abuse, medical neglect, and even forced sterilization.
“Compared to the population that is traditionally seen in the immigration system, the level of trauma and psychological distress of those caught up in this new abduction machine will be much greater,” Jonathan White, a former U.S. Public Health Service Corps commander who worked with detainees during Trump’s first term, told Politico.
White, now running for Congress as a Democrat, said the people being detained today often have deep ties in the U.S. “These people are proportionally much more likely to have the most severe psychological reaction to being removed, because they have many years in this country, roots in their communities, and U.S. national children who they’re being separated from.”
ICE has not commented on the current hiring spree. But Assistant Homeland Security Secretary Tricia McLaughlin has rejected claims of neglect. “Any claim that there are ‘inhumane’ conditions at ICE detention centers is false,” she said last month.
“All detainees are provided with proper meals, medical treatment, and have opportunities to communicate with lawyers and their family members. It is a longstanding practice to provide comprehensive medical care from the moment an alien enters ICE custody. This is the best healthcare that many aliens have received in their entire lives.”
Still, advocates say the conditions inside some facilities tell a different story. Around 60,000 people were being held by ICE or Customs and Border Protection as of September 21, and many of them are in makeshift detention centers like Fort Bliss in Texas or Florida’s infamous “Alligator Alcatraz.”
At those sites, detainees and their families have reported overcrowded metal cages, worm-infested food, poor sanitation, and failing air conditioning in the middle of the Everglades heat. Lawmakers say some facilities have even refused unannounced inspections, which Democrats argue is against federal law.
Adding to the concern, Trump recently cut hundreds of federal jobs responsible for monitoring detention conditions. One former worker told NPR, “More people are going to die in custody as a result, because there are not going to be the same level of checks and balances internally.”