Cecilia Lei

As far back as 2001, the Supreme Court ruled that ICE couldn't hold immigrants indefinitely and set the cap at six months.

Usually, immigrants who have lived in the U.S.

unlawfully for a certain period of years were eligible for bond hearings.

It allowed them to make a case to a judge that they weren't a flight risk and they could contest their deportation order outside of detention.

But now the administration has been enforcing what has been referred to as a mandatory detention policy, meaning that that avenue to seek bond is closed.

And that's having a big impact on people like 34-year-old asylum seeker Felipe Hernandez Espinoza.

Originally from Nicaragua, he crossed the U.S.-Mexico border in 2022 and requested asylum.

Last July, he was arrested at work.

He has been in detention for months, first at the Florida detention center known as Alligator Alcatraz, where there have been reports of disturbing conditions.

Later, Hernandez was transferred to a detention center in El Paso, Texas.

And throughout that time, he said that he signed documents asking to return to Nicaragua or Mexico.

But every time he asked that, he was told that he needs to see a judge.

He finally got a hearing scheduled for two weeks from now.

Even as the Trump administration has offered to pay people like Hernandez to leave the country and to cover their airfare, these long delays are indicative of a key detention policy change.

The AP reports that there are currently more than 70,000 people in ICE detention, and nearly 8,000 of them have been held for more than six months.

DHS has said that it is following the law and pointed to a recent appeals court ruling that did, in fact, allow the administration to continue detention without bond hearings.

But the problem is so acute that one immigration attorney told Solomon that clients are saying, I don't know why I'm here.

I'm ready to be deported.

Before we let you go, a few other stories we're following.

The mass shooting at a school in Canada on Monday left at least six people dead, including a teacher and five students, and dozens more injured.