Durbin Releases GAO Report Raising Alarms Over Changes In Inspections In ICE Immigration Detention Facilities

Durbin Releases GAO Report Raising Alarms Over Changes In Inspections In ICE Immigration Detention Facilities

Due to the failed inspections, ICE facilities have provided inadequate medical care, unsafe food, and failures in suicide prevention

SPRINGFIELD - Today, U.S. Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL), Ranking Member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, led the release of the Government Accountability Office's (GAO) newly-completed report examining the Trump Administration's decision to cut U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) inspection requirements of immigration detention facilities. These cuts stand in stark contrast to a massive surge in immigration detention. From April 2025 to April 2026, the average daily detained population jumped by more than 50 percent as active facilities expanded from 128 to 172. This growth was fueled by an explosion in funding, with ICE receiving over $45 billion for immigration detention in those two years alone.

With fewer inspections, there is even less accountability for ICE and its contractors, including widely documented failures to provide adequate medical care and safe and edible food and to prevent suicides. The GAO report is released after Durbin called for the GAO to expand its pending investigation of mental health care to include medical care and mismanagement of federal contracts in ICE detention facilities.

In the report, GAO outlines how detention oversight has been gutted during the second Trump Administration. The GAO examined four Department of Homeland Security (DHS) offices charged with inspecting detention facilities. The DHS Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman (OIDO), an independent office with statutory authority to conduct surprise inspections, has been shut down entirely. ICE's Office of Detention Oversight (ODO) office has decreased its inspections following policy changes under this Administration-it went from inspecting larger facilities twice a year to once a year or less. Its total inspections dropped from 194 to 102 in one year. DHS now allows many smaller facilities to inspect themselves and usually tells facilities in advance when inspectors are coming. ICE justified these changes by stating few inspections would ease the obligations on facilities and would make it easier to contract with local and state partners to detain individuals. ICE Health Service Corps (IHSC), which inspects medical care in detention, has kept its process the same. The DHS Office of Inspector General (OIG) received $20 million for extra inspections.

Consistent with this Administration's irresponsible and cruel approach to immigration policy, the GAO found ICE's changes to detention inspections were not backed by data. ICE failed to analyze evidence, such as past inspection deficiencies or contract compliance, to assess how ICE can adequately conduct oversight over its rapidly growing detention facilities and ensure facilities comply with detention standards.

"On Tuesday, the American people overwhelmingly rejected the Trump Administration's cruel immigration tactics-including inhumane ICE detention facilities, where people lack adequate access to food, water, and medical care," said Durbin. "Now that the power has shifted in Congress, the Trump Administration should take immediate steps to respond to this new alarming GAO report, which found ICE has reduced inspections without assessing the impact on detained individuals."

In the report, GAO also noted that another accountability measure recently lapsed. Since Fiscal Year 2019, appropriations language barred funding a contract with a facility after two consecutive less-than-adequate ODO ratings. That provision was left out of the FY26 DHS Appropriations Act. ICE told GAO that failing ratings now will no longer block continued funding, allowing private prison contractors like GEO and CoreCivic to fail inspections by ODO with no consequences.

In the report, GAO urges ICE to use real data to determine whether the reduced inspections are enough to keep facilities safe and compliant, and adjust its inspections based on what it finds.

A copy of the final report can be found here.

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