The Trump administration is aiming to make illegal migrants ineligible for bond hearings as they contest their deportation cases in court, according to The Washington Post.
All foreign nationals who unlawfully crossed the U.S.-Mexico border must remain in detention for the duration of their deportation proceedings, according to interim guidance ordered by acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) director Todd Lyons and obtained by the Post. The directive, which was dated earlier in July, is expected to apply to millions of illegal migrants currently living in the country. (RELATED: EXCLUSIVE: Top House Committee Digs Into Orgs That Turbocharged Biden Border Crisis)
The policy change could prove monumental in disincentivizing illegal immigration, with countless illegal migrants having long been allowed to live and work freely in the U.S. after being released from immigration custody, typically due to limited detention capacity.
“Detention is absolutely the best way to approach this, if you can do it,” Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, an organization that advocates for lower levels of immigration, stated to the Post.
TOPSHOT – US President President Donald Trump (2L), Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (L), and Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem (R) tour a migrant detention center, dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” located at the site of the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport in Ochopee, Florida on July 1, 2025. (Photo by ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS / AFP) (Photo by ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS/AFP via Getty Images)
“It costs a lot of money, obviously,” Krikorian continued. “You’re pretty much guaranteed to be able to remove the person, if there’s a negative finding, if he’s in detention.”
Neither ICE or the Department of Homeland of Security responded to requests for comment from the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Due to capacity limitations and other factors, ICE detains noncitizens “only when necessary,” according to its 2024 annual report. However, illegal migrants are currently subject to mandatory detention without bond if they’ve been convicted of murder or other heinous crimes — and Trump signed into law the Laken Riley Act, requiring mandatory detention of illegal migrants involved in theft-related crimes.
The directive by Lyons follows President Donald Trump’s signing of the Big, Beautiful Bill into law, which supercharges funding for ICE enforcement and detention.
Approximately $170 billion in funding from the mega-bill has been designated for immigration and border enforcement. Of this funding, more than $45 billion is specifically earmarked for ICE detention space over the next four years, which will open tens of thousands of new beds at ICE facilities across the U.S.
As of June 29, just over 57,800 individuals were in ICE detention, according to the latest data from the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University. The Trump administration anticipates that an enormous cash infusion will allow the country’s detention capacity to expand to roughly 100,000 beds, allowing room to keep more migrants detained, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.
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