Ohio sees uptick in number of local jails holding immigrants

By Nadia Ramlagan

More Ohio immigrant residents are being arrested and held in jail, but they aren't being charged with a crime, according to a new report. Instead, they're incarcerated under so-called “civil detention” unique to immigration law.

Lynne Tramonte, executive director of the Ohio Immigrant Alliance, which released the report, said it’s taxpayers who are shelling out more money to detain and hold immigrants in local jails.

"We don't enforce any other civil laws this way, by putting people in a criminal jail, and we shouldn't be doing it with immigration cases either," she said. "We should let people work through their cases in the immigration courts."

Local municipalities are entering into formal agreements with ICE under section 287(g) of the Immigration and Nationality Act. This allows them to receive monetary compensation for holding immigrants. According to the report, there were 20 Ohio counties with 287(g) agreements on the books between the start of President Donald Trump’s second term and March 2026.

Tramonte said her organization receives frequent calls from people detained by ICE in county jails across the state.

"And they tell us they're not getting access to their medication for diabetes and cancer," she said. "They tell us that they can't eat the food, that they have to spend thousands of their own dollars just to buy edible food in these jails."

According to the report, as of March 18, 46 people have died under ICE care or custody since the beginning of the second Trump administration. The health care policy and research group KFF found that 32 of these deaths occurred in people with existing medical conditions.

Ohio organizers are planning a week of action May 23-30, with interfaith vigils planned at three different jails.