U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has hired a private security firm with a documented history of abuse allegations to help locate undocumented immigrant children who arrived in the country alone and were subsequently released into communities, according to contracting records.
The contract, awarded in mid-April to MVM Inc., a Virginia-based company with roughly 2,500 employees, tasks the contractor with conducting what ICE calls "safety and wellness checks" on unaccompanied minors. The agency frames the work as verifying children's locations, school enrollment, and general welfare, including screening for abuse or trafficking.
But an internal ICE document obtained last year revealed a different picture. The agency's actual operations aim to deport the children or pursue criminal charges against them or their adult sponsors, which immigration advocates have characterized as "backdoor family separation."
MVM emerged as the winning bidder after 18 companies submitted proposals. The government's contracting analysis emphasized that only MVM possessed sufficient "boots on the ground" infrastructure and personnel to physically locate and conduct checks on the children. The contract duration is set for one year, though the payment amount and number of planned checks remain redacted.
The contractor's selection has ignited sharp criticism from immigration attorneys and advocates. MVM carries a troubling record tied to immigration enforcement work.
In 2024, two Guatemalan fathers sued MVM in California federal court for allegedly committing "torture, enforced disappearance and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment" during the family separation campaign of the first Trump administration. The lawsuit alleges MVM "physically took thousands of children away from their parents and transferred them to shelters" using unmarked vehicles, commercial airlines, and makeshift detention centers. A federal judge dismissed some claims on procedural grounds in March 2025 but allowed the torture and enforced disappearance allegations to proceed.
The company's troubling past extends further back. In 2018, MVM was accused of holding immigrant children in an abandoned office building for three weeks during the family separation crisis. During the COVID-19 pandemic, it detained immigrant families in hotels pending removal. Most recently, in August 2024, the nonprofit newsroom Injustice Watch reported that MVM locked an immigrant woman and her baby inside a Chicago hotel for five days.
The contractor also ran the secretive Guantanamo immigration detention center until 2025, when another company took over operations.
"We have seen MVM harm children in federal immigration custody in egregious ways for many years now," said Neha Desai, managing director of children's human rights and dignity at the National Center for Youth Law. "It is both deeply disturbing and completely unsurprising that this government has hired MVM to conduct so-called wellness checks. These checks have already terrorized numerous children and have led to family separation throughout the country."
MVM did not respond to requests for comment. A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said the company has "ZERO immigration enforcement authority" and that its role in the "UAC Safety Verification Initiative" reflects ICE's commitment to protecting vulnerable children from sexual abuse and exploitation. The agency denied that it targets or arrests children, calling such accusations "FALSE" and an attempt to demonize law enforcement.
The Trump administration began intensifying efforts last year to track down immigrant children who entered the U.S. alone. After arrival, the Office of Refugee Resettlement places unaccompanied minors in shelters, foster homes, or with sponsors while their immigration cases proceed. ICE, partnered with local law enforcement, has launched operations to locate those children, which officials claim have gone "missing."
Michael Lukens, executive director of the Amica Center for Immigrant Rights, challenged that framing. "Their parents know where they are, their lawyers know where they are, usually the courts know where they are," he said. "It's just ICE doesn't have their address in a file. Those kids were never missing but they're using it as an excuse to do these wellness checks."
A 2024 Homeland Security Inspector General report that found ICE unable to adequately track minors attributed the problem primarily to understaffing and poor interagency communication, not trafficking. Yet Trump administration figures have pointed to that same report to argue that children have been lost and exploited, fueling the push for expanded tracking operations.
Immigration advocates see the wellness checks differently. "This all seems like a ploy to do two things: one, find either kids or their sponsors to arrest and deport. Or, two, scare children into self-deporting," Lukens said. "It's really deplorable. It's really concerning."
Author James Rodriguez: "Handing this mission to a contractor already sued for torture in family separation cases isn't oversight, it's outsourcing accountability."
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