HOW MANY DEATH OF PERSON IN CUSTODY, OBAMA ADMINISTRATION
Executive summary
The best available reporting compiled by advocacy groups and independent researchers counts 56 people who died while in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody during the Obama administration (2009–2017) [1][2]. That figure comes from a FOIA-based tally published in the Fatal Neglect report and has been echoed across multiple outlets and analyses [2][3].
1. The raw count: 56 deaths in ICE custody under Obama
A coordinated review of ICE records obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests and summarized in the Fatal Neglect report and subsequent reporting counted 56 individuals who died while in ICE custody during the Obama years; that total includes at least six suicides and at least one death following a suicide attempt [2][1]. Multiple independent outlets, advocacy organizations and some commentators have reproduced that 56‑death figure when comparing administrations [4][5].
2. What the 56 covers — and what it does not
The 56‑death figure specifically refers to deaths of people held by ICE (the civil immigration detention system) and does not equate to all “border deaths” or deaths in U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) custody; reporting on border fatalities uses different datasets and often counts deaths occurring along the border outside agency custody [6]. Fact-checkers and Human Rights Watch emphasize that the ICE detainee tally should not be conflated with claims that children died in Border Patrol custody during the Obama era — reputable reviews found no evidence that minors died in Border Patrol custody then [7][8].
3. Patterns and context found in reviews of those deaths
Advocacy reports and Human Rights Watch’s analysis of ICE death reviews identified repeated medical and oversight failures — inadequate medical care, missed referrals, misuse of isolation for people with mental disabilities — and concluded those failures likely contributed to a portion of the deaths reviewed [3][9]. Fatal Neglect asserts that ICE’s inspections and post‑death reviews sometimes failed to acknowledge or correct substandard medical care that played a role in fatalities [1][3].
4. Broader tallies and comparative framing
Counting frameworks vary: ICE’s historical public tallies and other trackers place the cumulative number of ICE custody deaths since 2003 at figures such as 159, within which the 56 Obama‑era deaths sit [2]. Commentators and some think tanks have used the 56 number to compute death rates per detainee across administrations, but those comparisons depend heavily on the detention totals used and on whether one compares ICE detention, CBP custody, or border‑region deaths [4][5].
5. Limits of available reporting and divergent narratives
The 56‑death figure rests on records obtained and interpreted by advocacy groups and FOIA requests; official agency accounting, scope definitions (ICE vs. CBP, adults vs. minors), and differing methodologies produce room for debate and occasional misinterpretation in public discourse [3][6]. Media pieces and partisan commentators have at times conflated separate datasets (e.g., border deaths, CBP custody, ICE detention), which has fueled misleading claims about children dying in custody under Obama — claims debunked by fact‑checking organizations and investigative reporting [7][8].