WASHINGTON — The Trump administration will be required to publish detailed arrest information every month, including location, detentions and removals of U.S. citizens, lawful residents and former U.S. military members, under new bipartisan legislation.
The administration must include data about self-deportations, countries of origin, asylum claims and sentencing outcomes as part of the agreement, unveiled Tuesday.
The legislation includes $20 million for the purchase and use of body cameras for federal immigration police and a separate $20 million for “inspections and oversight of detention facilities,” such as Delaney Hall in Newark, one of two federal detention sites in New Jersey. Private contractors run both locations. Elizabeth Detention Center is the other.
The bill is the latest in a series of incremental steps Congress, in particular from Democrats, have taken to curb the administration’s hardline stance on immigration — an issue that rocketed to national attention this month when a federal immigration agent shot and killed an unarmed woman, Renee Good, 37, in Minnesota.
A year into his second term, Trump has fallen short of his goal to deport 1 million people a year. But his administration has sharply expanded the footprint of federal immigration enforcement across the country and “dramatically reshaped the machinery of government to target unauthorized immigrants,” as the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute wrote in a report this month. “The impacts on individuals, families, workplaces, and the nation’s overall economic outlook and global standing will be felt for years ahead.”
Within New Jersey, that reshaping has meant plans to use a military base in Burlington County to detain and deport 1,000 to 3,000 immigrants. It has also meant the reopening of Delaney Hall, where the vast majority of detainees have no criminal records. And it has meant the federal criminal prosecution of a sitting Democratic congresswoman from New Jersey, whose case stems from an oversight visit she made to Delaney Hall.
After Good’s death, and the widespread public outcry that followed, Democrats in both chambers of Congress have pushed to limit the powers and budget of DHS, the parent agency of ICE.
“That’s going to be a standalone issue,” Rep. Herb Conaway (D-3rd) said about funding for the department in an interview last week. “We’re going to demand that action be taken to deal with the lawlessness that is evident to anybody who has been watching any 24-hour news coverage or reading any paper or seeing the film of the killing of Ms. Good.”
Conaway added, “We are going to take a very strong position on bringing protections to the American people.”
Funding for many large departments and agencies within the federal government, including the Department of Homeland Security, will expire Jan. 30 unless Congress passes funding legislation and President Donald Trump signs it into law.
The deal keeps funding for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement flat at $10 billion for the rest of the budget year — a far cry from defunding the agency, a demand of immigration activists — and lowers the agency’s enforcement and removal programs.
Connecticut Rep. Rosa DeLauro, the House’s top Democratic appropriator, said Tuesday the compromise legislation does not include some of the “broader reforms Democrats proposed,” like thwarting DHS from detaining and deporting U.S. citizens or blocking the department from using other agencies’ personnel for immigration enforcement.
“I understand that many of my Democratic colleagues may be dissatisfied with any bill that funds ICE,” DeLauro said. “I share their frustration with the out-of-control agency.”
In a separate maneuver, Democrats in the House, including a trio of representatives from New Jersey, are moving to impeach Kristi Noem, the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. Noem’s impeachment is highly unlikely in this Republican-majority Congress, but could be a priority in the next Congress if Democrats gain control of the chamber.
Credit: (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)Noem has defended the ICE officer who shot and killed Good, saying he “followed their training.” Detention and deportation of immigrants has been a hallmark of the second Trump administration. Good was a U.S. citizen.
In an interview Thursday, Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-12th) said Noem should be impeached and removed because she has deceived the public, pointing to the Good killing in particular.
“My eyes don’t deceive me,” Watson Coleman said. “The lying and manipulating and intentional misstatements by Noem are disrespectful to the oath that she has taken,” she said, referencing the oath federal officials take to defend the U.S. Constitution.
Noem, Watson Coleman said, has “lied about ICE supposedly doing its job legally and we all can see that it is not.”
Watson Coleman is one of more than 70 Democrats in Congress, including three Democratic members from New Jersey — Reps. Rob Menendez (D-8th) and LaMonica McIver (D-10th) are the others — who last week signed on to legislation to impeach Noem.
“We’re very concerned about immigrants, our neighbors and all these acts of unconstitutional behavior, undemocratic behavior,” Watson Coleman said.
Had Democrats succeeded in removing all funding for ICE from these budget negotiations, the agency would still be able to continue operating with $75 billion in separate funding it obtained through the Republican budget law that entered into force in the summer of 2025.
That law gave enough money to the department to more than triple its detention capacity and reach more than 100,000 beds.
Language included in the spending deal proposed Tuesday cuts funding for 5,500 beds and directs ICE to inform Congress with plans to improve “medical services for all detained aliens in ICE” custody and ensure all detainees receive recreation time.
