Human-rights groups have asked the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention to intervene after U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement scrubbed more than 16,000 names from its Online Detainee Locator System on September 15. The change—unannounced until advocates discovered it last week—affects detainees who already have final removal orders, making it virtually impossible for families, attorneys, or employers to confirm their whereabouts. For global companies, the blackout raises serious duty-of-care concerns. Foreign nationals who fail to appear for planned client meetings or plant visits could in fact be in ICE custody with no immediate way for corporate security teams to locate them. Mobility managers also risk breaching data-privacy rules if they circulate personal information in the scramble to find missing assignees. ICE says the purge will “streamline removals,” but civil-society organizations counter that it violates federal transparency requirements and undermines detainees’ right to counsel. They want the agency to restore full search functionality and publish regular custody updates. Practical steps for employers include adding contingency clauses to relocation agreements, collecting secondary emergency contacts, and instructing external counsel to file G-639 FOIA requests if a worker disappears from the system. Until the locator is restored, proactive monitoring of local courthouse dockets and ICE flight schedules may be the only way to track an employee’s status. The UN working group is expected to decide within 60 days whether to issue an urgent appeal. A formal rebuke could pressure ICE to reinstate public listings, but mobility teams should prepare for a protracted transparency battle.
Source: Associated Press
