What were the COVID-19 protocols for ICE agents during the 2020 pandemic?

1. Official framework: “incorporate CDC guidance” and existing health protocols

From the agency’s public statements in March 2020, ICE described its pandemic playbook as building on preexisting infectious-disease monitoring and management protocols and stated it was incorporating Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance into operations for detainees and facilities, with specific mention of using airborne-infection isolation rooms where available ^[1].

2. Operational specifics for detainees and facilities

ICE said asymptomatic detainees at epidemiologic risk or with mild illness could be placed in airborne-infection isolation rooms, and individuals with moderate to severe symptoms would be transferred to hospitals with high-risk-care capability; the agency reported that 16 of 20 ICE Health Service Corps facilities had such isolation rooms ^[1]. Those descriptions apply to detainee medical handling and facility-level infection control rather than step-by-step public protocols for line agents in the field ^[1].

3. Litigation and oversight: courts demanded — then later scaled back — agency safeguards

A federal judge issued an injunction in April 2020 that required ICE to implement COVID-19 safeguards across detention centers, a decision later narrowed when the Ninth Circuit concluded in 2021 that universal court oversight was not warranted even as it acknowledged the agency’s policies may have been flawed; the appeals majority held the flaws did not justify extraordinary nationwide supervision, while a dissenting judge argued the record showed ICE had done too little in April 2020 as the virus spread in medically vulnerable populations ^[3].

4. Complaints and watchdog claims of inadequate implementation

Civil-rights and advocacy groups pushed back that written policies were not matched by conditions on the ground; the ACLU of Texas filed an administrative complaint in March 2020 alleging ICE failed to take necessary hygiene and safety actions at the Rio Grande Detention Center and asked the DHS inspector general to investigate and order remedial measures ^[2]. That complaint exemplifies broader civil-society claims that ICE’s stated adoption of CDC guidance did not translate into consistent mitigation steps across facilities ^[2].

5. What the records do not clearly show — frontline PPE and enforcement-era protocols for agents

The available reporting in this packet details ICE’s detainee- and facility-focused medical protocols and litigation over those policies, but does not provide a comprehensive, source-cited playbook for how ICE agents in the field were required to behave day-to-day (for example, formal PPE checklists, mask mandates for agents during arrests, or precise quarantine rules for agent exposures) beyond general claims of adopting CDC guidance ^[1]. Because the sources here lack those operational-level prescriptions, definitive assertions about every procedural requirement for agents (as distinct from facility medical protocols) cannot be made from this record.

6. Competing narratives and institutional incentives

ICE’s public framing emphasized built-in health protocols and use of isolation rooms to show compliance with public-health norms ^[1], while advocates and litigants emphasized implementation gaps and health risks inside crowded detention settings ^[2]. Courts mediating the dispute weighed public-health concern against limits on judicial supervision of an agency, with a divided record leading to a rollback of broad oversight even as critics warned of continuing dangers ^[3]. Those conflicting accounts reflect institutional incentives: ICE sought to reassure the public and maintain operations, while advocates sought external enforcement and transparency.