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This article was originally published by Prism.

While detained at Michigan’s North Lake Processing Center, Lucia learned she was pregnant — a nightmare scenario for her and many other women who are held in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody while pregnant.

“I prayed every day for God to take care of my little angel,” said Lucia, who is using a pseudonym for fear of retaliation and harm.

Originally from Venezuela, Lucia left the political turmoil of her home country in 2022 as the COVID-19 pandemic also abruptly ended her ability to study nursing.

“I left because I was looking for a better future,” she said.

She was in the U.S. for three years before the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) rescinded Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for multiple countries, including Venezuela, in February 2025. An ICE traffic stop that year in Detroit landed Lucia in detention, just weeks after her partner was also detained by ICE.

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Lucia was transferred to four different detention centers before arriving at the South Louisiana Processing Center in Basile, Louisiana. She described her time there as “horrible.”

“I saw many high-risk pregnancies,” Lucia said.

Her own pregnancy was classified as high-risk due to a previous miscarriage. Lucia told Prism that she met dozens of pregnant women while in detention.

“I saw a woman who gave birth,” she said. “I saw her in a wheelchair with her newborn crying, and a nurse was taking her somewhere. I never saw her or her baby again.”

A recent investigation from The Guardian corroborated Lucia’s claims. ICE is arresting a record number of pregnant women and teenagers who cannot access the medical care they need, according to the reporting. At the same time, the agency appears to have lost count of how many people had miscarriages after October 2025.

In an emailed statement to Prism, a DHS representative said that “being in detention is a choice” and that “pregnancy in ICE detention is exceedingly rare.” The spokesperson also alleged that pregnant women receive regular prenatal visits, mental health services, and nutritional support.

“Claims that there are subprime conditions at ICE detention centers are false,” the representative said. “For many illegal aliens this is the best healthcare they have received their entire lives.”

According to experts and advocates, the racist cruelty and abusive immigration policies women in ICE detention face are built on a legacy of eugenics, an ideology that aimed to “improve” the human population based on white supremacy.

An Alarming Escalation

Often referred to as “Basile,” the South Louisiana Processing Center is the single women-only immigrant detention center in the state. In July, videos created by women detained at the facility went viral, exposing inhumane conditions and alleging sexual abuse.

Basile is located in rural Louisiana and has an extensive history of denying migrants access to food, interpreters, and medical care. The facility is 1 of 10 ICE detention centers in Louisiana, known as the “incarceration capital” of the U.S. for having the county’s highest rates of incarceration.

Documents from DHS released earlier this year further corroborated Lucia’s account of meeting a large number of pregnant women in detention.

According to government records, ICE detained approximately 498 pregnant, postpartum, or nursing immigrants between Jan. 1, 2025, and Feb. 16, 2026. The detention of pregnant people shows an alarming shift away from Biden-era policies that required their immediate release from federal custody.

Louisiana is often at the center of allegations of reproductive injustice in detention. Over the last year alone, detained women in the state have made serious allegations of medical neglect and sexual abuse. This includes the case of a Jane Doe, who alleged last year that she was sexually abused and threatened by Manuel Reyes, Basile’s former assistant warden. Trans immigrants have also alleged that Reyes “ran an off-the-books late-night work scheme” that coerced them into “physically and psychologically painful labor.”

For women detained at Basile, it can be difficult to separate fact from fiction, due to ICE’s extensive history of malpractice and dishonesty.

Lucia told Prism that this reality, paired with the everyday mistreatment of detained immigrants, has fueled an environment that is full of medical mistrust. As an example, when she was first detained at Basile, she said that women inside instructed her not to accept any vaccines or medications from the medical staff because they would “make you miscarry.” Because Prism would not reveal Lucia’s identity to DHS, the agency said it could not comment on any of her claims.

Allegations of medical abuse have been documented at other detention centers. For example, in 2020 at the Irwin County Detention Center, ICE contracted an OB-GYN named Mahendra Amin to provide care to detained women. He was later found to have carried out invasive and unnecessary gynecological procedures on detained women without their full and........

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