ProPublica: ICE Detained Immigrant Domestic Violence Victims at Michigan Facility After Kent County Jail Handoffs

ProPublica reported on October 14, 2026 that immigrant women who called police about domestic violence were arrested, turned over by the Kent County jail in west Michigan to ICE, and held at the North Lake Processing Center, including women identified by first name only, Leya and Pilar, whose charges were dropped or never filed. ProPublica says there is no comprehensive way to track how often this happens; it spoke with a half-dozen alleged victims held at North Lake and, from hundreds of habeas corpus petitions filed nationwide, found dozens of petitioners who were arrested on suspicion of domestic violence and turned over to ICE although they were never charged or their charges were dropped. Leya and Pilar asked that ProPublica not interview their alleged abusers, so the accounts of abuse are theirs alone.

The reporting ties the detentions to rule changes and local cooperation. On inauguration day the administration rescinded guidelines that largely prevented arrests at sensitive locations such as domestic violence shelters, and about a week later it eliminated key protections for VAWA applicants and other crime victims. Local 287(g) agreements rose from fewer than 150 in January 2025 to more than 2,600, and Kent County, which has no such agreement, turned over more immigrants to ICE in the first six months of 2026 than during the entire Biden administration. A federal judge ordered the protections restored in May and the administration has appealed. The pattern, a jail’s detainer practice routing victims of crime into civil detention, is the 287(g) expansion working through counties that never signed on.