Healthcare workers want ICE banned from hospitals, and blue states are responding

Federal agents in combat fatigues gather in Minneapolis last month. Health care workers in Minnesota and other states say ICE is increasing its presence at health care facilities and discouraging people from seeking medical care. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)

Last month, the parents of a 7-year-old girl whose nose wouldn’t stop bleeding took her to Portland Adventist Health in Portland, Oregon, for emergency care. Before the family could get through the door, federal immigration agents arrived Reportedly arrested them in the parking lot and took them to a detention center in Texas.

At Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis, workers say U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents are on campus asking patients and staff for proof of citizenship. Tensions reached a peak last month when ICE agents handcuffed a 31-year-old Mexican immigrant to his hospital bed. ICE claimed the man, who had broken bones in his face and a fractured skull, intentionally ran headfirst into a wall while handcuffed and tried to escape.

And last summer, ICE agents chased an immigrant into the Ontario Advanced Surgery Center in Ontario, California, resulting in an accident Confrontation with two employees of an operation center Wearing scrubs. The two workers came later accused indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of assault and obstruction of federal immigration agents.

As the Trump administration ramps up its immigration crackdown, health care workers in several states say ICE is increasing its presence at health care facilities, discouraging people from seeking medical care and creating chaos that endangers the safety of their patients.

Republican-led states like Florida and Texas began voting even before Trump took office last year Mixing health care and immigration control by requiring hospitals to ask patients about their immigration status. Now that ICE has expanded its enforcement efforts to include hospitals and health care facilities — areas that were largely off-limits during the Biden administration — more and more Democratic-led states are fighting back.

Last month, Massachusetts Democratic Gov. Maura Healey filed a proposal legislation “to keep ICE away from courthouses, schools, child care programs, hospitals and churches,” and signed one Implementing regulation to limit ICE actions on government property.

In December, Democratic Illinois Governor JB appointed Pritzker signed a measure That prohibits health care providers from sharing confidential health information with federal immigration authorities and requires hospitals to develop policies on how they will do so interact with agents.

And in September, California’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, signed it legislation This protects health information about immigration status and place of birth and prohibits agents from entering non-public, patient-sensitive areas of health care facilities without a warrant signed by a judge.

Other democratic states – including Maine, New Jersey, fresh York, Oregon And Washington – are considering similar bills.

In the meantime, republican Arizona lawmakers are pushing for it legislation That would require hospitals that accept Medicaid patients to include a question about immigration status on intake forms.

Foregoing medical care

Whether or not ICE presence at health facilities is actually increasing, it is clear that people living in the country illegally are being discouraged from seeking health care, said Drishti Pillai, director of immigrant health policy at the health policy research group KFF.

A KFF and the New York Times Opinion poll The study, released last November, found that 43% of respondents who identified as immigrant parents living in the country illegally skipped or delayed health care for their children over a 12-month period because they were worried about immigration enforcement. Even among legally present immigrants, 10% said they avoid seeking health care for their children because of immigration concerns.

Pillai also pointed to the Trump administration’s efforts to consolidate the pieces of personal information stored in various federal agencies, creating a single treasure trove of information about people living in the United States.

“We expect that these concerns have further intensified this year since the data sharing agreement was made public, and there are some privacy concerns going forward,” Pillai told Stateline.

Dr. Paula Latortue, a Washington, D.C.-based gynecologist who volunteers with the Migrant Clinicians Network, a nonprofit group that provides health care to immigrants, said it’s unclear how many people are avoiding health care and how often.

“The only part that’s really hard to know is the people who don’t show up at the hospital when they normally would to make an urgent or urgent complaint,” Latortue said in an interview. “But I think what happened is a concern for many doctors in the community.”

States intervene to protect sensitive places

The Biden And Obama The governments directed ICE to avoid enforcement actions at “sensitive” locations such as hospitals, schools and churches unless they received permission from top leaders at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

However, in January 2025, the Trump administration lifted These policies open up these spaces for immigration enforcement.

Stateline reached out to the White House and the Department of Homeland Security multiple times but received no response. When the administration changed the policy, the Department of Homeland Security said that opening “sensitive” areas to agents “strengthens the brave men and women at CBP.” [Customs and Border Protection] and ICE to enforce our immigration laws.”

According to Sophia Genovese, a legal scholar specializing in immigration law at Georgetown University, previous guidelines did not prohibit ICE from operating at these locations, but they “strongly discouraged” it.

However, she added that states and cities can enact laws to protect such spaces, although their ability to “violate and participate in immigration law enforcement” is constrained.

“Search warrants are always required to conduct searches or investigations in private, non-public areas, and those search warrants must be signed by a judge. This is simply a fundamental Fourth Amendment right,” Genovese said. “When it comes to ICE entering hospitals and gaining access to private areas of hospitals, that is a matter of individual hospital policy.”

Genovese said states can also require hospitals to standardize their policies about where law enforcement officers can go within a medical facility and create protocols to ensure officers present a warrant before entering the premises.

Healthcare workers want protection

These steps are exactly what healthcare workers in many states are demanding.

“There is a high level of fear and anxiety. Nurses are watching the videos of what is happening across the country, and nurses have experienced it themselves,” Peter Starzynski, spokesman for the Oregon Nurses Association, told Stateline.

Last month’s incident involving the 7-year-old girl and her parents in Portland showed the importance of protecting health care facilities from ICE, he said.

“This should never happen. This is disgusting,” Starzynski said.

The Oregon Nurses Association has also done this sentenced ICE’s presence at Legacy Emanuel Medical Center in Portland, claim Agents violate hospital policies, including regarding access to patients. Legacy has disputed the union’s allegations, saying no ICE officers have entered its facilities “unless they were accompanying a patient in custody.”

“Emergency room nurses interact with local law enforcement on a regular basis, and these relationships are based on mutual respect, with law enforcement understanding what they need to do when they enter a hospital,” Starzynski said. “That has changed with the increase in federal agents in Oregon.”

Stateline reporter Shalina Chatlani can be reached at shatlani@stateline.org.