Deaths of immigrants held in US detention centers have increased during Donald Trump's second term.
Posted June 26, 2026
United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk has called for an independent investigation into the serious rise in deaths in immigration detention centers during President Donald Trump's second term.
In a statement Friday, Turk expressed concern about the lack of transparency about those deaths, at least 19 of which have occurred so far this year, according to U.S. government statistics.
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“Those responsible for violations of the law must be held accountable and the rights of victims' families to truth, justice, reparation and guarantees of non-repetition must be upheld,” the UN rights chief said.
Deaths in immigration detention centers have increased during Trump's second term, a byproduct of what human rights groups and immigration lawyers have described as systematic neglect, inhumane conditions and abuses.
The Trump administration has sought to rapidly expand the network of immigration detention centers, some operated by private contractors, as it seeks to carry out mass deportations of immigrants in the United States.
Trump stated in a social media post on Friday that his administration has the “highest average daily arrest rate by ICE and CBP, including full detention, with final deportation orders, of any president, by far!”
The reported death of a Georgian, Mamuka Artmeladze, at a detention center in Louisiana on June 4 increased the number of fatalities so far this year to 19, up from 33 last year and 11 in 2024.
“The mortality rate for deaths in ICE custody is at its highest level in more than a decade and has more than doubled since Trump's second term began,” the watchdog group Human Rights Watch wrote in a report on deaths in custody earlier this month. “The rate is almost four times that of the Biden administration and more than two and a half times that of the first Trump administration.”
That report said the 52 people who died in detention during Trump's second term were between the ages of 19 and 75 and came from 20 different nationalities.
Turk wrote Friday that there have been “disturbing allegations about the use of force” at those facilities and that five of the deaths recorded in 2026 were classified as suicides.
He also expressed concern about the reported use of solitary confinement, which is associated with an increased risk of suicide and considered a form of torture by the UN after a 15-day period.
“All of these factors exacerbate vulnerability and raise serious concerns about whether some of these deaths in ICE custody could have been prevented,” he said.
