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ICE has not paid for detainee medical care for 7 months
The termination of payments to providers has coincided with a massive spike in detainee deaths and medical crises.
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On October 3, 2025, the Trump administration abruptly stopped paying third-parties for medical care provided to detainees in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Third-party providers are used to provide “medically necessary” care including “dialysis, prenatal care, oncology, [and] chemotherapy,” according to ICE.
A document posted to an official government contracting website by ICE on November 12, described the situation as an “absolute emergency” that needed to be resolved “immediately” to “prevent any further medical complications or loss of life.”
According to the ICE Health Service Corps (IHSC), payments to third parties were supposed to resume on April 30, 2026. ICE has contracted with a private firm, Acentra Health, to process reimbursements.
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But when April 30 arrived, payments to third party medical providers did not resume. Instead, Acentra quietly updated its website stating that “[c]laims payment services are estimated to begin during the second quarter of [sic] 2026 calendar year (April — June).”
For decades, routine processing of third party medical reimbursement were processed for ICE by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), through the VA Financial Service Center (VAFSC). This did not divert resources from the VA as it was compensated by ICE for this service. The arrangement was terminated with no notice after the VA’s role was criticized by right-wing activists.
In a statement, a VA spokesperson says the department is ensuring claims are being processed during the transition. “[The Department of Homeland Security] has signed a new contract to process these claims and is currently onboarding the vendor,” VA spokesperson Pete Kasperowicz told KFF Health News in February. “Meanwhile, VA is supporting this transition until May to ensure claims are processed appropriately.”
A source at the VA with direct knowledge told Popular Information that this is false. “No claims are being processed,” the VA source said. “We’ve done zero work to support [ICE] since they couldn’t pay us.” The source spoke on the condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to the media.
Kasperowicz’s claims are also directly contradicted by the IHSC website, which stated in an April 24 update to providers, “[p]lease continue to hold all claim submissions while IHSC works to bring the new system online in the interim.” The IHSC website announced on October 3, 2025, “Do not mail or submit electronic claims to the VAFSC until further notice. All mail will be returned to sender.” All subsequent communications about the VA’s role repeated this guidance.
For more than seven months, third parties have not been able to be reimbursed for medical services provided to ICE. This has coincided with a massive spike in detainee deaths and medical crises.
As ICE cuts off payments for medical care, detainee death skyrocket
The decision to stop reimbursing third parties for the medical care of ICE detainees has coincided with a significant spike in deaths, according to data released by the agency.
From 2018 to 2024, the average number of people who died in ICE custody annually was 8.9. That includes a spike in 2020 related to the onset of the COVID pandemic. In 2025, 33 people died in ICE custody, including 12 after the medical reimbursements stopped.
The trend is accelerating. In the first four months of 2026, 18 people have died in ICE custody. Since ICE stopped medical reimbursements on October 3, 2025, people have been dying in ICE custody at a rate of 51.7 people annually. This is more than five times the dea