WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Representatives Madeleine Dean (PA-04), Mary Gay Scanlon (PA-05), Summer Lee (PA-12), and Chris Deluzio (PA-17) wrote a letter to the Acting Director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) exposing the lack of data transparency in current ICE records management and reporting, specifically in its partnerships with state and local law enforcement.
“According to published federal records between January 1 to August 6, 2026, of the 1,227 Pennsylvania 287(g) arrest records, only 12 of those records included the task force designation agency that was involved in arrest. ICE chose to withhold that information more than 1,000 times so far this year despite such information being a designated field included in arrest records. This discrepancy undermines transparency and leaves the public without a clear understanding of which agency or department was involved,” the lawmakers wrote.
The 287(g) program established a partnership between ICE and state or local law enforcement to authorize selected officers to carry out federal immigration enforcement or deportation. Specifically, the lawmakers are demanding training records, complaints, and oversight records about 287(g) programs in Pennsylvania to be made public.
“The public has a right to clear and complete information about the nature of the enforcement activities taking place in our neighborhoods and the departments or agencies responsible for carrying them out. Programs between federal and local law enforcement agencies must meet the highest standards of transparency,” the lawmakers continue.
Following a recent visit to Moshannon Valley Processing Center in central Pennsylvania, Congresswoman Dean lead her Pennsylvania colleagues in letters to ICE and the GEO Group, the for-profit prison corporation that owns and operates MVPC, to demand answers on GEO’s failure to comply with federal standards of adequate staffing and medical care to detainees, as well as obstruction of congressional oversight.
Congresswoman Dean also recently introduced the Oversight Access Act to expand congressional oversight at ICE facilities without prior notice and the No Shock Act to ban the use of electric shock gloves by ICE agents.?
Read the full text of the letter here.
Rep. Madeleine Dean is a mother, grandmother, attorney, professor, former four-term member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, and U.S. Representative for the Fourth District of Pennsylvania.
###
