On Thursday, June 4, 2026, acting ICE Director David Venturella sent agency employees a memo eliminating the requirement that ICE report deaths that occur within 30 days of a person's release from its custody, The Washington Post reported. “ICE is returning to the standard practice of reporting deaths that occur while an individual is in agency custody,” Venturella wrote. DHS confirmed the change.
The 30-day rule was adopted in 2021, after a man who contracted COVID-19 at the Adelanto detention center in California died three days after ICE released him, to keep ICE from avoiding accountability by releasing gravely ill detainees. “The policy changed to make clear that ICE should not release people simply to avoid deaths in custody,” said Deborah Fleischaker, ICE's acting chief of staff at the time. DHS said, “Under this updated policy, when an individual is no longer in ICE custody then ICE will no longer be responsible for monitoring or reviewing deaths that may occur,” and called the change “common sense,” while saying ICE “remains committed to transparency regarding detainee deaths.”
The rollback came as deaths in ICE detention ran at their highest level in two decades. ICE reported 18 deaths in the first five months of 2026, on pace to surpass the at least 30 recorded in 2025, the most since 2004 (see At Least 60 People Have Died in ICE Custody Since Trump's Second Term Began, at a Death Rate Far Above Recent Years).
Correction (October 2, 2026): The entry said 32 deaths were recorded in 2025; the cited reporting puts the 2025 toll at “at least 30.” It also said the change took effect immediately and that ICE would still report deaths in transit or under ICE watch at a medical facility; none of the sources loaded say so, and those details were removed. The title no longer says “quietly,” since DHS confirmed the change publicly.