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US immigration authorities are detaining and deporting pregnant, postpartum and nursing people. Available data and reporting indicate that this policy is not being consistently implemented in practice. Pregnant individuals often lack adequate prenatal care in ICE detention. Between 1 January 2025 and 16 February 2026, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) deported at least 363 pregnant, postpartum or nursing women, according to data released by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) following a Senate inquiry. As of mid-February 2026, 2,686 pregnant women remained in ICE custody, including nine women in their final trimester of pregnancy. By late September 2025, at least 16 miscarriages had reportedly occurred in immigration detention. DHS also acknowledged that it did not fully track nursing mothers in its custody. In an additional 498 cases involving pregnant or nursing women, ICE was unable to confirm the outcome, leaving unclear whether the women had been deported, released from custody or received medical care. The failure to maintain complete records regarding the custody, medical treatment and outcomes of hundreds of pregnant and nursing women further undermined transparency and accountability.

The available evidence raises serious concerns regarding the adequacy of medical care provided to pregnant, postpartum and nursing women in immigration detention. Research and documentation by various human rights groups, including Amnesty International, has identified deficiencies in access to timely and appropriate prenatal, obstetric and postpartum care. The detention of pregnant individuals in facilities unable to provide adequate and continuous medical services exposes them to heightened and potentially avoidable risks to their health and, where applicable, the health of their fetuses and newborn children. The continued use of detention is particularly concerning given the existence of alternatives that would allow individuals to remain in their communities while immigration proceedings are pending. Pregnant, postpartum and nursing individuals could, in many cases, have been released under less restrictive measures. Nevertheless, immigration authorities continue to rely on detention and, in some cases, removal, including the deportation of individuals during pregnancy or shortly after childbirth.

Amnesty International and other human rights groups have found that the detention and deportation of pregnant, postpartum and nursing people must be assessed not merely as isolated administrative failures, but in the context of broader enforcement policies that increasingly prioritized detention and removal over individualized assessments of health, vulnerability and family unity. The evidence indicates that foreseeable harms are compounded by inadequate monitoring, insufficient access to medical care and the failure to consistently apply existing safeguards intended to limit the detention of particularly vulnerable individuals. The detention of pregnant, postpartum and nursing individuals in circumstances that may compromise access to adequate health care, the separation of infants from their parents, and the removal of pregnant people during advanced stages of pregnancy raise serious concerns under US constitutional and statutory protections as well as international human rights law. These practices may implicate, among other rights, the right to health, the right to liberty and freedom from arbitrary detention, the right to family unity, and the obligation to ensure that all individuals deprived of their liberty are treated with humanity and respect for their inherent dignity.

US authorities should ensure that migration-related deprivation of liberty be clearly prescribed by law and strictly justified by a legitimate purpose that is necessary, proportionate, and non-discriminatory. Detention without such a purpose is considered arbitrary. A limited number of specific purposes are recognized as legitimate grounds for migration-related detention under international law and standards, including verifying identity following an individual’s arrival in a country and preventing a person from absconding following an objective assessment of flight risk in relation to a transfer, removal, deportation or expulsion procedure that has been initiated, is in progress and has a reasonable prospect of being executed within a reasonable time frame. They should also ensure uninterrupted access to appropriate prenatal, obstetric, postpartum and pediatric care; prohibit practices that result in unnecessary separation of infants and young children from their parents; and establish transparent systems to document and publicly account for the detention, transfer, release, medical treatment and removal of all pregnant, postpartum and nursing individuals in immigration custody. Failure to implement such safeguards risks perpetuating violations with serious and, in some cases, irreversible consequences.