The airport security every traveler passes through is now part of the immigration dragnet.
This week the Washington Post reported that ICE is expanding arrests inside airports nationwide.
Documents obtained by watchdog groups show how it works. In May 2025, ICE and the TSA signed a data-sharing agreement. Several times each week, TSA sends ICE lists of people flying through American airports — names, photos, travel details. Agents wait at check-in counters, arrival gates, and jetways. The New York Times documents arrests at no fewer than fifteen airports.
On Tuesday at BWI airport in Baltimore, ICE agents arrested Dr. Fatima Ameaka as she boarded a domestic flight. She is a public health researcher at Johns Hopkins, a former Fulbright Scholar with a doctorate in pharmacy. She studies how to improve responses to disease outbreaks like measles.
DHS says she overstayed her visa. But documents obtained by ABC News show she holds a work authorization permit valid until 2029 and has a pending asylum case. She was held in Louisiana, released Saturday, but her colleagues say her family and lawyers had been unable to reach her.
Her arrest is one of at least a dozen by ICE at Washington-area airports alone.
The airport security every traveler passes through is now part of the immigration dragnet.
Notes To My Future Self 