ICE Lost Count of Detainee Miscarriages, Democratic Lawmakers Demand the Data

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has admitted it failed to record data on miscarriages suffered by immigrants in its custody between October 2025 and June 2026. Democratic lawmakers are now urgently demanding that the agency disclose how many pregnant immigrants experienced miscarriages, stillbirths and pregnancy-related hospitalizations while detained.

The demand follows a recent Guardian investigation revealing that the Trump administration is detaining a record number of pregnant women and teens, while at the same time losing track of how many of them suffered miscarriages.

In a letter to ICE's acting director, David Venturella, US representatives Brittany Pettersen, Joyce Beatty and Robin Kelly also asked the agency to explain what steps, if any, have been taken to recover the missing data. The letter was cosigned by 64 other representatives.

Government documents obtained by the Guardian found that ICE placed more pregnant immigrants in detention last fall and winter than at any time over the previous year. The agency recorded 18 miscarriages during the first nine months of the Trump administration, but it has no data on miscarriages after 3 October 2025.

Detained pregnant women said they were struggling to access routine and emergency medical care. Medical experts told the Guardian that lapses in care during pregnancy and during and after miscarriage could escalate treatable conditions into life-threatening emergencies.

In their letter, the representatives also cite a 2021 directive instructing ICE to wholly avoid detaining pregnant, postpartum and nursing immigrants unless release is prohibited by law or exceptional circumstances exist. The directive also requires ICE to closely monitor and document the health of all pregnant people in its custody, and to continuously evaluate whether it is medically advisable to keep them detained.

The lawmakers wrote that ICE's inability to follow agency directives, provide adequate medical care and maintain accurate records of pregnancy-related medical outcomes is unacceptable. They also asked the agency to clarify on what grounds it is detaining pregnant immigrants.

In an interview, Pettersen said it was deeply concerning that ICE had failed to account for a full year of pregnancy outcomes. She said she was devastated for the people who have gone through this, who have lost pregnancies unnecessarily and who have been left without the medical care they need after miscarrying, and that it was hard to imagine how these wrongs could ever be righted.

In internal agency documents, ICE said it had no data on miscarriages because the agency changed medical billing providers in October. The agency's medical claims processing has been delayed for months. Immigration attorneys and former government officials said it was odd, but plausible, that ICE was keeping track of miscarriages solely via its medical billing provider.

In response to follow-up questions about its tracking practices after 3 October 2025, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees ICE, first said the agency was tracking miscarriages in monthly reports. Later, the spokesperson confirmed what was in ICE's internal documents — the agency does not have data on miscarriages between October 2025 and June 2026.

The DHS did not confirm to the Guardian whether it had received the lawmakers' letter. An agency spokesperson said claims that any pregnant detainees are receiving substandard care are false.

In their letter, the lawmakers also asked ICE's acting director to detail when ICE leadership first became aware of concerns regarding miscarriage reporting and deficiencies in the agency's tracking systems. They gave the agency until 6 November to respond.

Prior to the Guardian's reporting, the agency had never acknowledged that it had lost count of miscarriages — not even when US senators asked the agency for the data. The Guardian filed a Freedom of Information Act request and then filed suit in collaboration with the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press to obtain data on the number of pregnant people in ICE detention and the health outcomes for this population.