ICE Shuts Down Program Providing Taxpayer-Funded Cell Phone Minutes to Detained Migrants

Migrants detained in facilities operated by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) will no longer receive over eight hours of taxpayer-funded cell phone minutes per month, a move the agency says will save over $10 million.

ICE, the agency that oversees the nation’s civil immigration detention system, says that they implemented the phone minutes program during the COVID-19 pandemic in order to ensure migrants could contact their families and legal counsel.

Typically, ICE takes noncitizen migrants into custody that are considered flight risks, national security threats, pose a substantial risk to public safety, or are subject to mandatory detention and are facing deportation due to being convicted of a crime in the U.S.

“During the COVID-19 public health emergency, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement followed CDC guidelines to protect those in our custody including by pausing in-person visitation,” the agency said in a Tuesday statement.

“To ensure noncitizens could still visit with their families, loved ones, and attorneys, the agency paid for 520 phone minutes per month for each person — at no cost to those in custody,” they said.

“It was the right thing to do at the time,” they added.

Now that in-person visitation has been reinstated, the agency has ended the free cell phone minutes program.

ICE said that by not providing the 520 taxpayer-funded phone call minutes per month to the detainees, the agency is saving $10.2 million.

While the decision to end the free phone minutes program came into effect on Aug. 1, ICE is still providing pro bono legal services to noncitizen detainees through tablets — part of its “Virtual Attorney Visitation” system.

ICE stated that they would “gladly reinstate” the taxpayer-funded phone minutes program, given “adequate appropriated funds” from Congress.

Immigration activist organizations have denounced the agency’s decision, claiming that shutting down the program violates the rights of the migrant detainees.

Last month, dozens of migrants being held in custody at the Golden State Annex ICE Detention Center in California began a hunger strike in protest of conditions at the facility.

Among the protesters’ demands was reinstating the taxpayer-funded phone minutes program.

“Stop charging us to call our families, lawyers, and communities,” the group demanded.