Attorneys representing more than 600 ICE detainees are expected back in court next week to argue before an appellate court that their clients should be released.
The hearing follows a ruling by Federal Judge Jeffrey Cummings earlier this month, who found that hundreds of ICE detainees should be released from custody because ICE agents violated the terms of a 2022 consent decree that set firm boundaries on ICE agents’ use of “warrantless” arrests.
In court filings, ICE asserted that the terms of the consent decree had expired in June.
But Judge Cummings’ ruling stated otherwise.
In his 52-page order issued in early October, Cummings found that ICE had violated the terms of the consent agreement by making “warrantless” arrests throughout 2025 – including in “Operation Midway Blitz.”
But before any of the more than 600 detainees on the list were released – most of whom ICE deemed to be a “low risk” to public safety, attorneys for the federal government appealed Judge Cummings’ ruling. The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals issued a stay on the release.
The matter was put on pause this month until oral arguments could be made during a hearing, which is set for next week.
Throughout the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in Chicago, attorneys and family members of those arrested by Border Patrol or ICE agents have said it’s been difficult to communicate with the detainees. They’ve alleged through a separate federal lawsuit that it’s hard to make phone calls or reach those being held in ICE custody, and that an ICE website devoted to detailing where detainees are being held isn’t always working or up to date.
NBC 5 Investigates used the list of 604 ICE detainees to measure where ICE detainees from Chicago have been held across the country.
This point-in-time snapshot offers a view into where detainees have been transported to county jails and ICE detention facilities across the country.
NBC 5 Investigates’ analysis found more than 164 detainees were taken to an ICE detention facility in Baldwin, Michigan; at least 61 were taken to a facility in Texas; another 26 were placed at a detention facility in Brazil, Indiana.
At least six jails throughout Kentucky have been used to hold ICE detainees from the Chicago area.
NBC 5 Investigates could not find information for 190 people on the list of 604 people, which was made public through the ongoing litigation in Cummings’ court.
LOCATIONS OF THE PEOPLE LISTED:
“No Info on Ice Locator”-190 | North Lake Correctional Facility – Baldwin MI-164 | ERO El Paso Camp East Montana – El Paso TX-61 |Clay County Justice Center – Brazil IN-26 | “Error”-14 | Greene County Jail – Springfield MO-12 | Hopkins County Jail – Madisonville KY-12 | “ICE locator only says ‘In ICE Custody – Call ICE for Details’”-11 | Campbell County Detention Center – Newport KY-11 | Eloy Federal Center Facility (Core Civic) – Eloy AZ-10 | Marion County Jail – Indianapolis IN-10 | Grayson County Jail – Leitchfield KY-9 | Kay County Justice Facility – Newkirk OK-9 | Port Isabel Service Detention Center – Los Fresnos TX-9 | Jackson Parish Correctional Center – Jonesboro LA-7 | Oldham County Jail – La Grange KY-7 | Adams County Correctional Center – Natchez MS-6 | Clark County Jail – Jefferson IN-6 | Webb County Detention Center – Laredo TX-5 | Christian County Detention Center – Hopkinsville KY-4 | Winn Correctional Center – Winnfield LA-4 | Boone County Jail – Burlington KY-3 | Calhoun County – Battle Creek MI-3 | Chase County Detention Facility – Cottonwood Falls KS-2 | Otero County Processing Center – Chaparral NM-2 | Clinton County Jail – Frankfort IN-1 | Dodge Detention Facility – Juneau WI-1 | El Valle Detention Facility – Raymondville TX-1 | Jena/LaSalle Detention Facility – Jena LA-1 | Pine Prairie Correctional Facility – Pine Prairie LA-1 | Stewart Detention Center – Lumpkin GA-1
The Department of Homeland Security has repeatedly responded to NBC 5 Investigates’ questions over the past few months by highlighting that the enforcement efforts in the Chicago area have targeted “the worst of the worst” and that “pedophiles, gangbangers and rapists” have been processed through the ICE processing facility in Broadview, IL.
While the Trump administration initially pitched immigration enforcement in Chicago as a means to address crime, immigration data from the TRAC website shows between 70 to 80 percent of those in ICE custody do not have criminal convictions, NBC 5 Investigates has found.
Court records show at least 75 people on the list of more than 600 have been removed from the U.S.
Rodrigo Domingo-Hipolito is one of those 75.
His name is on the list of 604 people who a federal judge says should be eligible for release from ICE custody.
But he has already self-deported.
Aside from a 2011 traffic conviction for driving on a suspended licensing – he has no criminal history.
He spoke to NBC 5 Investigates recently from Mexico – where he’s been since early November.
“Man it’s crazy. A lot of people. When I got there, there was like 90 guys inside the little room,” Rodrigo said of the Broadview facility, which has become the subject of a federal lawsuit alleging poor and inhumane conditions. DHS denies that there are poor conditions and has repeatedly said detainees received three meals a day have access to phones to communicate.
Rodrigo says he was arrested by immigration agents on his way to work in Cicero on October 3rd. He says he spent nearly six days at Broadview before being transported to an ICE detention facility in Oklahoma.
Online immigration court records show an immigration judge approved his request to voluntarily deport himself on October 21.
Rodrigo says he chose to do so because of health reasons and that after consulting with immigration attorneys, he saw no other options.
“At that point I was thinking it was the right thing to do because I don’t want to spend any more time in the jail because of my health. It was not well so, and I don’t want to spend more time on jail,” he said.
He says he was later transported to a jail in Louisiana where he was held for several more days. Documents he shared with NBC 5 Investigates show he was offered a $1,000 to self-deport through a DHS program. He says he has yet to receive the money.
He says conditions there were just as packed as what he experienced at Broadview and people got sick. He became upset when talking about the other detainees there whose families don’t know where they are.
“I think outside there is a lot of people – a lot of guys they need help a lot of people they never know if their family knows that they are inside,” he said.
The decision to self-deport was heartbreaking for him and his fiancé, Claudia, who asked not to use her last name because she – like Rodrigo – is undocumented.
“I feel a huge emptiness,” she said through tears. “I feel destroyed. Very destroyed.”
She told NBC 5 Investigates she is hopeful that he can return one day legally through obtained a visa because they had plans to settle down and buy a home together. They’ve been together for more than 10 years and now they’ve have no plans to see each other currently.
Since June, the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown is believed to have netted more than 3,300 arrests in the Chicago area. Attorneys estimate nearly 60 percent of those have been removed from the U.S.
While initially pitched as crime combatant, critics and those on the receiving end of the immigration enforcement efforts argue it has done little to address crime on a grand scale in Chicago, and instead has separated families.
“Yeah, man. It’s hard because 24 years living there. Now it’s a new beginning,” Rodrigo said.
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