As new policies roll out nationwide, judges will prevent bonds to most detained immigrants.
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Aurora, Colorado – A man walked through the corner of the Coral Pink Detention Center building and shuffled a bit to hold his shoes on his feet. They took his shoelaces. And his belt.
The 93°C temperature bouncing off the black asphalt as he walked freely for the first time in six weeks after a federal immigration agent in California arrested him during regular court check-in with the wife of an American citizen.
A year ago, he may have been one of dozens of men released on a day like this.
But a few months ago, the release here from the Private Operated Customs Enforcement Detention Centre was probably delayed to 5 a day.
The release from the now roughly 1,200-bed Geo Ice facility has been even slower as the Trump administration concludes with people accused of living illegally in the United States.
As new policies roll out nationwide, judges will prevent bonds to most detained immigrants. These hearings are often concluded by judges who agree to mail cash bonds and, in some cases, are tracked on a GPS device.
The White House argues that massive migration under former President Joe Biden was legally “aggression” and evoked both the language and tools of war to close borders and eliminate those who thought they had entered the country illegally.
“The Biden administration has unleashed violent gang members, rapists and murderers into our country under the guise of exile, unleashing fears about Americans,” Homeland Security Secretary Christie Noem said at a July 12 press conference. “Under President Trump, we put American citizens first.”
Immigration Courts offer limited legal rights
Statistics show that immigrants are far less likely to commit crimes than American citizens. And current federal statistics show that less than half of the migrants detained have criminal records.
However, since immigration courts are run by the Department of Justice and are not independent judiciary, people within that system are not entitled to the same protections. Include a quick trial right, if you can’t afford your own lawyer, or now a bond hearing., According to the administration. For detainees, bonds often range between $5,000 and $20,000, immigration attorneys said.
Advocates of immigration rights say the loss of bond hearings means detainees have to fight more and more against their deportation cases without legal representation, support or advice from community members. Detainees are often shipped to own facilities thousands of miles from their homes, advocates say.
The deportation battle can take months, and the immigration rights group said it suspects the policy change is intended to pressure immigrants to agree to deportation even in the event of a robust legal action to remain in the United States.
The Trump administration has not made public changes to its policy. Supporters said they first read about it in the Washington Post on July 14th. Others said that a Justice Department lawyer learned about the policy change when he read some of it to the judge during a bond hearing.
“The Trump administration’s decision to refuse bond hearings is a cruel and calculated escalation of its mass detention agenda, prioritizing imprisonment against the due process and focusing on for-profit prison businesses.” “The move will remove the lifelines of thousands of immigrants, reunite with their families, gather evidence, and strip them of their right to fight their lawsuits quite a bit.”
Detention will be late
Of all those detained in the facility, only one was released on July 15th. And like all those released, a team of volunteers from the nonprofit Casa de Pas met him on the streets. They provided him with a ride, a cell phone and food.
Andrea Roya, executive director of the nonprofit, said he’s seen the Trump administration’s gathering approach unfold as CASA volunteers speak to people who have been released. Like other immigration rights advocates, Roya said he was unhappy with the private prison company with close ties to the White House being able to benefit financially from the new policies.
“I don’t surprise you that this is the route we’re heading,” she said. “What we can expect right now is that there are very few releases.”
ICE previously lacked detention space to hold anyone accused of crossing the border outside its official port of entry, but in 2024 there was a “meeting” of 2.1 million people. The new July 4th federal spending bill will fund ICE for 80,000 new detention beds and fund an additional 10,000 ice agents to arrest, as well as custody up to 100,000 people at any time.
Historically, there was not enough dental space to hold everyone accused of immigration violations, so millions of people have been released to the community following bond hearings in which immigration judges weighed the possibility of a next court date. After that, they are free to live and work their own lives – legal or not – their deportation case remains pending, and it can take years.
According to Ice’s 2024 annual report, there were over 7.6 million people on what was called “non-superficial” dockets. People are accused of violating immigration laws, but the threat of continuing to be locked up was not sufficient. The agency had attached GPS monitors to detainees, and judges believed that the risk of violence was low, but a higher risk of not being able to return to court.
“Detention is not just cruel, it’s unnecessary.”
Each detention costs $152 per person daily, compared to $4.20 per day for GPS tracking., The ICE data will be displayed.
92% of people ordered to compete in immigration court hearings do so, according to the Vera Institute of Justice, a jail-right gaze group.
“We know that detention is not just cruel, it’s unnecessary,” said Elizabeth Kenny, Bella’s associate director. “The justification for government detention is simply not supported by research or even original data.”
Like many immigration rights advocates, Kenny said she hasn’t seen any particular policies yet.
In Seattle, Watson Immigration Law lawyer Termina Watson said details she had never seen were part of an ongoing management effort to limit legitimate procedures for those accused of immigration violations.
“They created a system that allowed people to restrain longer,” Watson said. “In effect, this means that people with a potential path to legality are being held indefinitely. The whole concept is to detain people, and I don’t know where it ends.”
