Press ReleaseUrgent2026-04-14

ICYMI: Escobar, Underwood, Warren, Luján Lead 32 Lawmakers in Pressing Homeland Security Watchdog to Investigate Detainee Locator System Failures

ImmigrationEnvironmentForeign PolicyDefenseInfrastructure

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This press release from Representative Veronica Escobar (D-TX) was published on 2026-04-14 and titled "ICYMI: Escobar, Underwood, Warren, Luján Lead 32 Lawmakers in Pressing Homeland Security Watchdog to Investigate Detaine". It focuses on immigration and touches on the environment, foreign policy.

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ICYMI: Escobar, Underwood, Warren, Luján Lead 32 Lawmakers in Pressing Homeland Security Watchdog to Investigate Detainee Locator System Failures

Last week, Congresswoman Veronica Escobar (TX-16), along with U.S. Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Ben Ray Luján (D-NM) and Representative Lauren Underwood (IL-14) led 32 members of Congress in pressing the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Inspector General to investigate Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) failure to provide accurate information about where detainees are being held. The DHS Online Detainee Locator System (ODLS) allows the public to determine whether a person is in ICE custody and, if so, at which facility. ICE’s policy has historically been to update ODLS within eight hours of a person’s arrival at an ICE facility. But recent reports indicate that some individuals are not being accurately added to ODLS for days — and sometimes weeks. In some cases, individuals are deported before their location is ever added to the system. ODLS has also become increasingly inaccurate since January 2025; in many instances, ODLS indicates that a person is being held at a particular detention center, but the facility will tell attorneys otherwise. The Trump administration is detaining people at unprecedented scale, exacerbating ODLS issues. There are currently more than 70,000 people in ICE custody, 80% more than in December 2024. Frequent transfers make ODLS updates more challenging, and matters are only made worse when individuals are held in unconventional detention settings such as military bases, state-run facilities like “Alligator Alcatraz,” ICE field offices, and soon, warehouses built for storing packages. The letter can be found in its entirety below and here . Dear Inspector General Cuffari: We seek an accounting of the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) failure to ensure transparency surrounding where people in its custody are taken and held. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has long maintained an online detainee locator system (ODLS) “so that family members and attorneys can locate detainees more easily online, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.” But since January 2025, that system has grown increasingly unreliable. Without a functional locator system, DHS is effectively creating “disappearances” on U.S. soil, and we urge the DHS Office of Inspector General (OIG) to investigate this matter. ICE created the ODLS in 2010 with the intent to allow the public to determine whether a person is in ICE custody and, if so, at which facility. Prior to the Trump Administration, ICE maintained a practice of adding adults in its custody to the record locator within eight hours of their arrival at an ICE facility. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) also uses ICE’s ODLS and has generally added individuals to the system after 48 hours in CBP custody. However, reports now indicate that many detained individuals are not showing up in the online detainee locator system in a timely fashion, if at all.5 Families and legal representatives have reported that the system can now “take two to three days or longer” to update — and sometimes weeks. Congressional offices have similarly reported trouble locating constituents in ICE and CBP custody. In some cases, individuals are deported before their location is ever added to the online locator system. At times, detained individuals cannot be located because the information in the ODLS is inaccurate. For example, one “35-year-old Cuban man could not be located at the California detention facility where U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said they had sent him, leaving his family and attorney frantically trying to determine where he was for more than a week.” There have been similar anecdotal reports of the locator showing that a person is detained at a particular detention center yet facility contractors telling attorneys the individual is not at that facility. In other cases, it appears that detainees are not being added to the ODLS at all. This emerging problem appears to be driven by several factors, including: Scale of detention: Part of the problem appears to be the sheer scale of detention: there are currently more than 70,000 people in ICE custody, compared to around 39,000 as of December 2024, and the Trump Administration aims to reach a detention bed capacity of over 90,000.Expanding to detain over 80 percent more people over just one year appears to have strained ICE’s systems, including ICE’s ability to update the ODLS. Number of transfers: ICE is transferring people between facilities more often than in past years — with a transfer rate more than double what it was in 2024 — introducing more errors into the system. ICE also appears to have changed how the ODLS handles the locations of individuals in the process of being transferred between facilities. Under ICE policy, the ODLS would traditionally “show that the detainee is in custody at the original facility until the detainee has arrived and been booked into the new facility.” Now, however, individuals “in transit” often do not show up in the system at all — sometimes for

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ICYMI: Escobar, Underwood, Warren, Luján Lead 32 Lawmakers in Pressing Homeland Security Watchdog to Investigate Detainee Locator System Failures Last week, Congresswoman Veronica Escobar (TX-16), along with U.S. Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Ben Ray Luján (D-NM) and Representative Lauren Underwood (IL-14) led 32 members of Congress in pressing the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Inspector General to investigate Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) failure to provide accurate information about where detainees are being held. The DHS Online Detainee Locator System (ODLS) allows the public to determine whether a person is in ICE custody and, if so, at which facility. ICE’s policy has historically been to update ODLS within eight hours of a person’s arrival at an ICE facility. But recent reports indicate that some individuals are not being accurately added to ODLS for days — and sometimes weeks. In some cases, individuals are deported before their location is ever added to the system. ODLS has also become increasingly inaccurate since January 2025; in many instances, ODLS indicates that a person is being held at a particular detention center, but the facility will tell attorneys otherwise. The Trump administration is detaining people at unprecedented scale, exacerbating ODLS issues. There are currently more than 70,000 people in ICE custody, 80% more than in December 2024. Frequent transfers make ODLS updates more challenging, and matters are only made worse when individuals are held in unconventional detention settings such as military bases, state-run facilities like “Alligator Alcatraz,” ICE field offices, and soon, warehouses built for storing packages. The letter can be found in its entirety below and here . Dear Inspector General Cuffari: We seek an accounting of the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) failure to ensure transparency surrounding where people in its custody are taken and held. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has long maintained an online detainee locator system (ODLS) “so that family members and attorneys can locate detainees more easily online, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.” But since January 2025, that system has grown increasingly unreliable. Without a functional locator system, DHS is effectively creating “disappearances” on U.S. soil, and we urge the DHS Office of Inspector General (OIG) to investigate this matter. ICE created the ODLS in 2010 with the intent to allow the public to determine whether a person is in ICE custody and, if so, at which facility. Prior to the Trump Administration, ICE maintained a practice of adding adults in its custody to the record locator within eight hours of their arrival at an ICE facility. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) also uses ICE’s ODLS and has generally added individuals to the system after 48 hours in CBP custody. However, reports now indicate that many detained individuals are not showing up in the online detainee locator system in a timely fashion, if at all.5 Families and legal representatives have reported that the system can now “take two to three days or longer” to update — and sometimes weeks. Congressional offices have similarly reported trouble locating constituents in ICE and CBP custody. In some cases, individuals are deported before their location is ever added to the online locator system. At times, detained individuals cannot be located because the information in the ODLS is inaccurate. For example, one “35-year-old Cuban man could not be located at the California detention facility where U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said they had sent him, leaving his family and attorney frantically trying to determine where he was for more than a week.” There have been similar anecdotal reports of the locator showing that a person is detained at a particular detention center yet facility contractors telling attorneys the individual is not at that facility. In other cases, it appears that detainees are not being added to the ODLS at all. This emerging problem appears to be driven by several factors, including: Scale of detention: Part of the problem appears to be the sheer scale of detention: there are currently more than 70,000 people in ICE custody, compared to around 39,000 as of December 2024, and the Trump Administration aims to reach a detention bed capacity of over 90,000.Expanding to detain over 80 percent more people over just one year appears to have strained ICE’s systems, including ICE’s ability to update the ODLS. Number of transfers: ICE is transferring people between facilities more often than in past years — with a transfer rate more than double what it was in 2024 — introducing more errors into the system. ICE also appears to have changed how the ODLS handles the locations of individuals in the process of being transferred between facilities. Under ICE policy, the ODLS would traditionally “show that the detainee is in custody at the original facility until the detainee has arrived and been booked into the new facility.” Now, however, individuals “in transit” often do not show up in the system at all — sometimes for