Trump Axes Office That Could Hold Him Accountable: ‘It’s Death By A Thousand Cuts’

The Department of Homeland Security is pulling the plug on the Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman, a key player in investigating misconduct within the immigration detention system. An internal email leaked to the public reveals the shocking details.

All public signage is being yanked, inspections are ceasing, and the office’s website—once a lifeline for families and attorneys seeking to file complaints—is now a ghost town. Basic information about the office’s role? Gone. Just like that.

The email cites a lack of funding from the latest Homeland Security appropriations bill as the reason for this closure. But is that really the whole story? DHS has yet to respond to inquiries about this alarming move.

This shutdown adds fuel to the fire of an already dire situation regarding oversight in immigration jails across the nation. Despite the Trump administration’s push to ramp up detention capacity, accountability is slipping through the cracks.

Earlier this year, a staggering 73,000 individuals were crammed into immigration detention facilities, although that number has recently dipped to around 60,000. Last year alone, over 30 people died in ICE custody—the deadliest year since 2004. This year is on track to be even worse, with 18 reported deaths already.

Adam Isaacson from the Washington Office on Latin America, who co-authored a report on the dismantling of DHS oversight bodies, claims this closure is part of a broader strategy to demoralize immigrants. “They want people to give up on their immigration and asylum cases by making detention as unbearable as possible,” he stated.

“If you’re trying to make detention as miserable as possible—because you believe, in some twisted way, that that’s a deterrent—then you’re going to do what you can to get rid of the ombudsman’s office,” Isaacson added. “It’s death by a thousand cuts, and this is just one more way they’re trying to push people out of the immigration system.”

Isaacson argues that this closure is illegal, pointing out that Congress established the office in 2019 and it officially launched in 2021. “It’s right there in the law: Congress created this office, so only Congress can take it away,” he emphasized, suggesting that previous appropriations could have kept it running.

The Trump administration had already crippled OIDO’s effectiveness, slashing its staff from over a hundred to just five by March of this year, even as the number of immigration detention facilities skyrocketed during Trump’s second term.

Homeland Security officials have openly admitted that harsh conditions in detention are designed to encourage “self-deportation,” pushing individuals to abandon their legal cases and return home. As one DHS spokesperson bluntly put it: “Being in detention is a choice.”