Hi, I'm Jill Sheridan, you host of Indiana Week in Review.

This holiday weekend, we're looking back at the issue of immigration in Indiana.

Earlier this year, the Trump administration made mass deportation and immigration enforcement a top priority.

Local sheriff' offices have agreed to assist, and the state has also committed to help detain people.

This has impacted immigrants around Indiana.

Indiana Week in Review is produced by WFYI in association with Indiana Public Broadcasting Stations.

From the week ending February 21st, 2025.

House Republicans approved a bill this week to give the attorney general more power to go after businesses that employ undocumented immigrants.

Critics say the unnecessary bill will lead to racial profiling and cause widespread terror in immigrant communities.

Deputy Attorney General Blake Lanning says the AG's office needs more authority to investigate businesses that might be employing undocumented immigrants, something he says create real problems for public safety, for public resources, and also for American workers who are in some places in some cases, displaced.

Alliance for Latino Migrant Advocacy co-founder Carolina Castoreno say the data doesn't support that.

Crime rates are lower among immigrant populations, and the unemployment rate is higher.

The majority of what is behind this bill, what is driving this bill is anti-Latino immigrant sentiment.

Businesses would have a defense against the attorney general's investigation if they took steps to verify their employees eligibility.

Ann DeLaney, what's wrong with going after businesses who are exploiting workers?

So do you think that the attorney general is marching into businesses because he wants to improve- increase the pay for those workers?

Is that what this is all about?

No, it's not, okay?

And first of all, that' an incompetent office to do this for a variety of reasons.

I mean, they've been disciplined by the courts twice already to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars in penalties because of either their incompetence or outright falsification, not clear which, and now we want to go and do this and it it it is all part of the Christian nationalist agenda.

It isn't it isn't good anymor to say that you hate Catholics or you hate Jews or you hate blacks.

That's, that's that's not good anymore.

So you could put all that hat on immigrants, which of course include a number of people in those three categories, and you hate them and you're going to go after them and you're going to penalize them.

This is something the federal government is supposed to be dealing with.

And I think we elected that person who's now the president, because he was going to solve this entire problem.

Why do we need the Todd Rokitas of this world to do anything?

The problem is going to be completely solved, just like inflation is going to be completely solved.

We have Donald The Felon Trump in charge.

The other the other big- It's J. Trump.

-the other, the other big piece of this bill is, Indiana law already require local law enforcement agencies and local governments to cooperate with federal immigration officials.

This takes it a little further and basically empowers local law enforcement agencies and particulars to act essentiall as federal immigration officers.

Is that and should that be the role of local law enforcement agencies who last I checked we're not exactly under burden.

Yeah.

And I think that's been a like it's been really fascinating to se how they feel about these bills.

I know a lot of the times they're neutral.

And then whenever you ease the burden a little bit, they'll move in support.

But I think their whole thing or their whole saying the whole time has been, we're already doing this.

And I think that's the crux of a lot of these immigration bills is that we're already doing this.

And if you want to sa it's a politics move, you can, but I don't really see anythin wrong with with clarifying it.

And really just the, the whole balance of this whole issue been fascinating to see because you have, on the one hand, the GOP saying we are a no tolerance illegal immigration, which I think that's important to clarify.

We're talking about illegal immigration here, not just regular immigration.

But then you also have the other side.

Like I thought it was fascinating that a lot of Democrats try to offer amendments to actually add crimina provisions for these businesses.

And then the you know, the response was, we're just kind of reflecting what's going on, across the country when it comes to the, the enforcement mechanisms.

But then you also have bills, like there's been a provision in the Senate the past couple of years that have been trying to give undocumented immigrants driving cards just as a- -bipartisan bill.

-But we recognize that this is happening.

And if it does, you know, affect people that are here legally, we want to make sure there's a mechanism to take care of those people.

So it's a really interesting balance to see the, you know, no tolerance.

We need to, you know, you know, write out the illegal immigrants versus the this is happening.

And we need to put more tools into, you know, the toolbox for people that are here legally.

Is the bill at this point largely it's mean, it does give the attorney general new powers to, to to investigate businesses.

There's no question that's new authority.

It gives the governor the power to withhold any and all state funding he'd like for up to a year from any local governmen or local law enforcement agency that is deeme to not be sufficiently complying with federal immigration officials.

But when you consider what local governments seem to already be doing, is this more about messagin than it is about actual policy?

I think clearly it's about messaging, because a lot of these things were already in place if in fact, and if being the operative word there, this were really a sincere attempt to deal with exploited workers and protect them.

There were numerous safeguards in place.

At the state and certainly at the federal level in terms of, Department of Labor or OSHA, in terms of safety if you're being put in unfair, unsafe conditions.

Civil Rights Commission now, now, grant you at the federal level, a lot of those programs may not exist.

Maybe this there is- I may have to just take back everything I said.

But I don't think this i clearly about exploited workers.

And it is interesting if you talk about empowerin all of these, officials to that didn't have the power to go in and essentially inspect private businesses before, think of how offensive it was when these same businesses, were being asked to enforce federal law as it related to vaccinations and health guidelines.

And in that case, many of the same lawmakers who want people going in to apprehend people who don't look like us, perhaps, didn't want any officials going into these same private businesses.

That is an encroachment upon, you know, our fundamental belief that private businesses can control their own operations.

Yet another example.

Of situational.

Ethics, which is all we have anymore.

From the week ending August 8th, 2025.

Governor Mike Braun said this week he wants the federal government to reimburse Indiana for any costs related to state personnel helping enforce federal immigration laws.

The Indiana Department of Homeland Security, Indiana Department of Correction, State Police, and Indiana National Guard recently signed agreements to do more to help federal authorities deport people.

ICE arrests have surged since President Donald Trump took office, and recent federal data shows that 1 in 4 people arrested by ICE in Indian in June had no criminal charge.

Braun has been critical of that, noting he wants to see undocumented immigrants with criminal records targeted for deportation first.

But he says he has no concerns they will worsen as state officials play a bigger rol in ICE arrests and deportations.

You got to get better at the process of differentiating between, the two.

And the fact is, that's not easy due to the dynamic of it.

So -but that doesn't mean that we shouldn't try better.

Braun also emphasized that when it comes to due process for people detained by state and federal authorities, he wants to ensure, quote, "we'r Whitley, will Mike Braun face any blowback for using state resources, at least initially, to act a federal immigration authorities?

I don't believe so, and I don't think that people will look at it and blowback.

I think they'll look at it as a back up.

I think it's see as a collaborative partnership.

As opposed to something that would be consistently draining the resources.

However, I do find it interesting that Braun has already asked for money to be paid back to Indiana for supportin and having such a partnership.

And so I think even in that request, he's thinking about how is this going to play on our finances, especially coming after this budget session, but more importantly, making sure that criminals are off the street and that we are working together with all of our law enforcement partners is really important.

I think Mike Braun is absolutely right that he's saying like no, no, no, if we're going to, you know, there's already long standing collaboration with federal authorities to help them in whatever way they request.

But these new agreements go a step further, and they're actually almost, in a sense, deputized as federal authorities to do some of this work, housing them at Miami Correctional for instance.

He's right to ask for reimbursement.

Should he be confident tha this particular administration is going to be giving out that money in any kind of timely manner?

No.

No.

And he won't stand up to the when he doesn't get the money.

You know, the irony of this i this is a perfect example of him being taken to the principal's office.

Last week, he complained about the fact that we weren't locking up criminals.

We were locking u people who weren't here legally.

Right.

But they were not violent criminals, which is the way it's been sold.

And.

And then he gets.

He shouldn't have said that.

He shouldn't have said that.

So now he's offering a thousand beds without an agreement as to who's going to pay.

And I don't see him.

He is so weak.

I don't see him standing up to Donald Trump saying, we're not going to take them unless-.

I don't see that.

He's going to fold as penance for having said the right thing last week.

Do you think that the state will have to spend resources without the immediate guarantee of federal reimbursement?

I mean, they might have to.

And that if if what's really interesting is we're talking about whether the feds will reimburse the state, the state owes like $14 million to counties for the same kind of thing for for housing state prisoners in local jails.

So, you know, I know we have the we technically have a thousand beds, but they're not in use now because we don't have enough staff for them.

So the money has to come from somewhere.

Is that, you know, some of this is obviously some of this is obviously the politics of it.

Right.

He there was attention being shown on the fact that Indiana didn't have any of these what are called 287-G agreements with ICE.

And all of a sudden boom, now we have them from the political standpoint, is just having signed the agreements enough without having to necessarily do a lot of work, yet.

I, I do think that this is just completely abhorrent.

The fact that he would agree to it in the first place.

So let's just start there.

I don't think he's going to get the money back that he's asking for.

To the points that have already been made, and in an already cash strapped state, we have education funding that is jacked up, people at risk for not having proper healt care, rural hospitals at risk.

This seems like a total misstep on the governor's part to participate in in the first place, especially with no guarantee that it's not going t negatively impact our finances.

And somebody ought to tell the people in Washington that Miami County is nowhere close to Speedway.

Yeah, namin naming it the Speedway Slammer.

I mean, yeah, you don't want- in Indiana you don't want to mess with the Indianapolis Motor Speedway very much, do you?

I do think that Roger Penske could have went a little bit harder with his, you know, comment about not using IndyCar branding and things like that.

But I do appreciate that he spoke up for his organization.

From the week ending September 19th, 2025.

Well, the state budget committee this week approved nearly $16 million for the Indiana Department of Correction to prepare its Miami facilit to house undocumented immigrants detained by U.S.

Immigratio and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.

DOC Commissioner Lloyd Arnold says the state money will be used for structural changes, equipmen and temporary housing for staff to open up a portion of the facility that's gone unused for the last few years due to staffing shortages.

DOC entered into a contract with ICE this week fo housing up to 1000 adult males.

Over the next two years, the state will receive about $291 per person per day from ICE, nearly four times as much as the $75 a day it costs to hous state prisoners at the facility.

Arnold says Indiana wouldn't enter into the contract without making a profit.

He says DOC will use that money to boost pay for correctional officers at Miami from $24 to $28 an hour.

Arnold hope that will boost personnel levels by better competing with other local employers.

The facility needs about 170 more staff.

If I can go work at Subaru and make $28 an hour and not have anybody punch me in the face or spit on me or assault me, I'm gonna go do that.

Some lawmakers expressed concern about the conditions of other facilities used by ICE in recent months to house detainees.

Arnol said detainees will be treated like offenders incarcerated by the state, and the DOC adheres to national standards.

We're trying to even refrain from the the moniker name that was given.

We still call it Miami Correctional Facility because that's what it is.

We're going to have a detainment center for those people that are in our care, to ensure to get back to their country of origin in a safe manner.

Democratic Representativ Greg Porter sharply criticized the state budget committee's decision to allow state fund to be used to prep the facility.

In a statement, he said, quote, they couldn't find the money to avoid cuts to social services, but they found the funds for this.

Jon Schwantes Is the state going to end up making money from this deal?

I think they probably will.

It would be hard not to, you know when you look at reimbursement rates that are likely for these types of, not inmates, detainees, and the and the scarcity of space for any number of reasons, legal challenge that we saw against, Alligator Alcatraz down in the Everglades and other places.

This, I guess, in the current climate, is something of a growth industry.

Now that you didn't ask me about, if that's the good thing or bad thing, you asked me the dollars and cents question.

And I guess from a dollars and cent standpoint, there's probabl it would be hard for the state not to come out ahead.

I, I think.

There were questions, when the state started signing, the 287-G agreements, with ICE, several weeks ago there were questions about like, what state resources are going to have to be spent here and how confident are you tha you'll get reimbursed for them?

Because we've seen in the first several months of the Trump administration, them just shutting off federal coffers to any number of things across the country.

But in this case, when it comes to Ice, you have the One Big Beautiful Bill act or whatever.

That, I mean just explode the ICE budget beyond any level we've ever seen before.

It seems should the state have confidence it's going to get the money and makes any relatively smaller investment that it has to make early on worth it?

I mean, this is a centerpiec of the Trump administration's, you know, platform right now.

So I think it they would assume it's a pretty safe bet.

But I do want to say, lik another issue here is staffing.

The Miami facility is like 1200 beds under capacity right now because they don't have the staff for it.

And some of this higher, you know, reimbursement rate, it's much higher than it actually costs them to house these detainees.

It sounds like some of it is going to be used to raise salaries so that they can bring in, you know, enough staff to add a thousand beds.

But, I guess the question i like, is higher pay alone enough to fix such a deep staffing problem?

That's my question.

They need a 170 What Lloyd Arnold said this week was they want they nee 170 more, correctional officers to to make thi fully operational, if you will.

Is raising hourly pay by $4 an hour enough.

And what does that do to the other correctional officers around the state?

Well, I mean, I know he did talk about moving correctional officers from other facilities to Miami.

But they're.

Not.

Replaced by somebody.

That creates a question about shortages.

There's no question that there's money to do it.

I mean, they reimburse and they say they cost them $75 a day.

And this is going to be somewhere north of $270 a person.

So there's money to do that.

So this is a you know, on one hand it's a it's a mone making operation for the state.

On the other one, this is one of Trump's highest priorities.

And if you would Governor Braun and you were concerned about repercussions, it seems to me it could work both ways.

If the Governor Braun knew how to negotiate because we could shut this down.

If we have penaltie for not having a special session or redistricting.

Well, a few weeks ago, we were talking to about the notion of the state reducing the amount of voucher, the the value of vouchers for child care, which again, I know is a bit of an apples to oranges, but it's just on the age continuum.

Do you care for peopl at that age or- or 18 years old?

Arnold talked about the idea of, like, the money that they're hoping to make from this.

Like he's hoping it has a ripple effect across the rest of the budget because, I mean, part of what you saw on this last session was almost every state agency got cuts and in some cases, deep cuts.

But DOC was one of the three places where they actually increased the funding becaus they absolutely kind of had to.

Add child care.

and beds at that facility.

Child child care and education.

There are lots of places that got cut that need it.

There's a question.

DOC was spending more than it was given, so they reall just needed to fill those holes.

Well, they and I think it's important to clarify that the role of the state budget agency that allocated this money.

Right.

They're not pulling from other sources.

They're they can only allocate money that's already there.

Right.

So the idea that, you know, we're pulling from all of these things, this particular their particular one look at out there.

But Trump does it.

Trump- Congress says no.

And Trump says I'm going to spend it anyway.

Indiana- [Speaking over one another] So the ide that you're pulling from other things is just not the case in this particular instance.

And I think this is one of the most common sense wins that you can give the Braun administration.

I mean, you're literally getting paid four times the amount of money to house these detainees for spots that aren't even used yet.

Sure, you can argue the staffing and things like that, but I mean, it's and you can go towards longer term benefits at that particular facility, but also just money straight into the job.

If you could also then agree that that gives us negotiating power with Washington, doesn't it.

Yeah, absolutely.

They can add that to the win list.

Oh there you go.

From the week ending October 17th, 2025.

U.S.

border cza Tom Homan visited the statehouse this week for an event hosted by Indiana Attorney General Tod Rokita and Representative J.D.

Prescott.

Speakers focused on immigratio legislation that failed to win passage in the General Assembly earlier this year.

Now dubbed the Fairness Act the proposal would require local law enforcement agencies to comply with federal detention requests and extend the amount of time detainees could be held before being turned over to U.S.

Immigratio and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.

Homan said he appreciated the state's cooperation in housing detainees at the Miami Correctional Facility, and he lauded partnerships between ICE and local law enforcement agencies.

He said he hoped Indiana lawmakers would back the so-called Fairness Act in the coming session.

It's going to mak our communities that much safer every day.

ICE agents are out there arresting public safety threats to national security threats.

Outside the event, dozens of protesters gathered with signs in hand.

Sharon Cruz, a former prosecuto who pivoted to immigration law last year, said Homan and state officials should respect the law and appreciate the value brought by immigration.

I know that this state is built on immigration, and I do not accept that we can just be sold off to be deported with no due process and.

No.

Rights at all.

Speakers at the protest urged attendees to keep showing up and to keep advocating for immigrants.

Indiana's next legislative session starts in January.

Chris, will Tom Homan's visit lead to stricter policies regardin immigration here in the state?

I certainly do think it can influence it.

Because, you know, maybe unlike redistricting, where you're seeing some federal government pressures, immigration policy is a winning issue for Republicans.

You saw that in the last the last election.

That's why Donald Trump made it one of the the key stakes of his, of his, of his campaign.

Is it still, though I agree with you, the polls suggested it was- - it was a public issue before- -but now you look at it with some of the raids and so forth.

I wonder if it's shifted.

And in fact, you hear th president's tone changing that.

The fight against crime, not not exclusively immigration.

Yeah.

I mean, the results of it.

Right.

Especially when you look at the southern border, I think it is his is working his his policies are working.

You have record low, crossings when it comes to, you know, monthly numbers and things like that.

So, I do think his visit will definitely spur an increased likelihood of a bill coming.

And I actually think the Indiana General Assembly has a pretty good track record when it comes to forming immigration policy that, believe it or not, last section got, a couple of bipartisan support.

Actually, there was a bill that basically clarified an existing Indiana law that already said that if you're a detention center, if you're a law enforcement officer, you have to cooperate with ICE.

So this bill pretty much clarified what that cooperation looks like.

And it went from, you know, using reasonable suspicion to just pull somebody over to upping.

It's a probable cause you have they have to be detained with a misdemeanor or a felony.

And then also shifting kind of the paperwork duty from the law enforcement officers to the detention centers, just to make sure that law enforcement officers continue to go and protect our communities and things like that.

And that was like a whol process throughout the session.

So it went from one area where nobody really liked it, to an area where it did get a little bit of bipartisan support.

So I do think.

In the House I mean, it did pass the House, but I know you got a differen bill or a different bill.

Okay.

The bill that was there, they alluded to it, this rally or this this event, got, I believe, through the house but didn't get here at all in the Senate.

So I do think, you know, maybe they were able to use that immigration bill that they passed last year is kind of the kind of the bellwether for the one coming up.

Where is this on the agenda of lawmakers?

Well, you know, they send the guy who's been accuse of taking $50,000 in a paper bag in an FBI sting, and they send him as a representative of the most corrupt administratio in the history of this country, to try to influence the Indiana General Assembly.

It's interesting that during the course of those discussions what they want is they want one language, one culture, and frankly, one, face, okay, they don't want blacks, they don't want, they, they don't want, Hispanics.

They want somebody who, frankly, practices the same religion, speaks the same thing and ha the same values as Todd Rokita.

I mean, that is dangerous.

This country's strength has always been that it's a melting pot, that we take all these diverse cultures and we put them through a public education system so that the first generation born here speaks the language, understands that the culture and understands the values of this country.

They want to stop that.

And I frankly think that that's part of the the Christian nationalist agenda.

And it's frightening from, from a- or ought to be frightening for anybody of any kind of diverse background or religion or color in this country.

Niki, Ann question the wisdom of using Tom Homan as a poster child for this cause.

And it and I did notice that he's still denying even this week and even in conservative outlets, saying I didn't do anything wrong.

And in fact the headlines about this event were competing with headlines about him saying for the umpteenth time I guess he didn't do anything.

It is this is a bad judgment about using him as- -interesting- It was an interesting choice, and I do think it impacted the the event a little.

Originally it was supposed to be public in the atrium and anyone could attend, and reporters could be around and then it was at the last minut moved inside the House chamber.

Reporters weren't allowed in.

Neither was the public.

It was an invite only.

So, I mean, they definitely wanted to create some space for him, but he still got to give his talk.

And, I think what Chris wa starting to say about the other bill is last year, they could stop the bill that people had a lot of questions about because they said, oh, we already have this one over here.

It does all this great stuff.

Boom.

But next year, I think it's going to be even more pressure on the on that cracks down on employers.

It requires jails to honor detainer requests.

And the big one is it gives a bunch of new power to the attorney general.

Well, and and speaking of the attorney general, Tod Rokita was cohost of this event.

The chief legal officer in the state of Indiana.

Is there a problem with the juxtaposition of hosting an event like that and having as your marque speaker somebody who is still, there's some cloud surrounding, cloud surrounding?

Well, I don't think he would I don't think yeah.

I don't think he was really thinking about that.

You know, he wanted the nam to come and talk on this issue and listening to his talk, you know, he had some pretty staggerin numbers that he threw out there.

You know, 2 million people that had been removed from the country, most of them self deported.

The majority, the vast majority of those people, you know, he's saying are criminal.

And and that is where I question because, the, you know talk to the protesters outside.

They are, you know, their core message is that the people are not getting due process.

So, how will we know?

I hope you've enjoyed looking back at the important issue of immigration in Indiana.

We will continue to follo what happens around this topic.

I'm Jill Sheridan, managing editor at WFYI.

Join us next week when we return for another Indiana Week in Review.

The views expressed are solely those of the panelists.

Indiana Week in Review is produced by WFYI in association with Indiana Public Broadcasting stations.