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Historical Context: Mortui Vivos Docent Did Not Begin in 2025

Published by: Mortui Vivos Docent Intelligence Project
Last Updated: 2026-02-11

Why This Page Exists

This project documents the current crisis — the 2025-2029 escalation of immigration enforcement violence, detention deaths, and civil rights violations under the Trump II administration.

But we are not naive enough to pretend this started in January 2025.

The deportation machine is an American institution. It was built over decades, by both parties, through laws, executive orders, contracts, and bureaucratic expansion. The current crisis is an escalation, not an invention.

We acknowledge the past. We focus on the present. We document for the future.

The Machine's History

  • 1882: Chinese Exclusion Act — America's first explicitly racist immigration law
  • 1924: Immigration Act — established national origin quotas designed to exclude non-white immigrants
  • 1996: Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRIRA) — signed by President Clinton (D). Created the legal framework for mass deportation, mandatory detention, and expedited removal. This law built the machine.
  • 2001: USA PATRIOT Act — expanded surveillance and immigration enforcement powers after 9/11
  • 2002: Homeland Security Act — created the Department of Homeland Security and ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement). ICE did not exist before 2002.

Administration by Administration

George W. Bush (R), 2001-2009:
- Created ICE and CBP within the new DHS (2002)
- Postville, Iowa raid (2008): 389 workers arrested at a meatpacking plant — the largest immigration raid in U.S. history at the time. Workers were processed in cattle show grounds. Children left without parents.
- ~97 people died in ICE custody during his administration
- Average daily detention population: ~25,000

Barack Obama (D), 2009-2017:
- Deported approximately 3 million people — more than any previous president
- Called "Deporter-in-Chief" by immigration advocates
- Expanded Secure Communities program (local police as immigration enforcers)
- Operated family detention centers at Artesia, Karnes, and Dilley
- ~75 people died in ICE custody during his administration
- Average daily detention population: ~32,000

Donald Trump I (R), 2017-2021:
- Family separation policy (2018): Deliberately separated children from parents as a "deterrent." At least 5,556 children separated. Some never reunited.
- Muslim travel ban (Executive Order 13769)
- Zero tolerance prosecution policy
- Attempted DACA termination
- Built the infrastructure — contracts, facilities, legal framework — that enabled 2025's explosion
- ~51 people died in ICE custody (including COVID-19 spike)
- Average daily detention population: ~40,000

Joe Biden (D), 2021-2025:
- Continued Title 42 expulsions for over a year
- Detention population rose from ~22,000 to ~38,000
- ~26 people died in ICE custody
- Expanded humanitarian parole programs (later targeted by Trump II)

Donald Trump II (R), 2025-present:
- 31-32 deaths in 2025 — highest since 2004
- 68,440 daily detention population (December 2025) — record high
- Operation Metro Surge: 2,000+ federal agents deployed to Minneapolis
- Renée Good and Alex Pretti killed by federal agents in Minneapolis (January 2026)
- TITUS contract: $55 billion Navy ghost network of detention infrastructure
- Congressional access to facilities restricted
- ICE inspections plummeted as detentions soared
- This is where we are. This is what we document.

The Death Toll

Since ICE began tracking deaths in 2004:

At minimum 290+ people have died in ICE custody.

The true number is higher. ICE's counting methodology excludes:
- People "released" from custody shortly before death
- Deaths at off-site hospitals
- Deaths during transport
- Deaths in facilities that don't report to ICE

For the complete year-by-year breakdown, see: ICE Custody Deaths by Year (2004-2026)

Standing on Shoulders

We did not invent detention death documentation. We continue work that others have done for years, often at great personal and institutional cost:

Organizations

Historical Parallels

The work of documenting what a government does to people in its custody is not new:

  • Emily Hobhouse (1860-1926) — Documented British concentration camps during the Boer War. Called a traitor. Her evidence changed policy and saved lives. The term "concentration camp" was coined for those camps. Read more →

  • Dorothea Dix (1802-1887) — Documented inhumane conditions in mental health institutions. Her "Memorial to the Legislature of Massachusetts" (1843) was one of the first systematic investigations of government custody conditions.

  • Ida B. Wells (1862-1931) — Documented lynchings across the American South when the government refused to. Her methodology — collecting names, dates, locations, and circumstances — is the foundation of what we do.

A rising tide lifts all boats. Their work made ours possible. Our work continues theirs.

Our Scope

Mission: Document the 2025-2029 crisis with Bellingcat-standard OSINT methodology.

What we do:
- Individual dossiers for every person who died in ICE custody or was killed by federal agents
- Pattern analysis connecting policies to outcomes
- Accountability documentation (Cabinet of Horrors) naming officials responsible
- Multilingual publication for affected communities

What we don't do:
- Relitigate every historical immigration death
- Pretend this is a one-party problem
- Editorialize beyond what evidence supports
- Soften language to protect powerful people

Every. Human. Matters.

Published by Mortui Vivos Docent Intelligence Project
Methodology: Bellingcat-standard OSINT — public sources only