The Hound | Feb. 5

Hi there,

It’s Thursday. There’s a lot of news around ICE today, so let’s unpack all the recent developments. ICE’s private prison contractors have spent millions lobbying banks to give them loans. Donald Trump is apparently panicking as ICE’s plans to build concentration camps around the country have run into obstacle after obstacle, even in incredibly MAGA-friendly parts of the country. And new polling shows just how underwater ICE and the Trump administration are with the American public, with 60% of voters not believing the administration’s account of Alex Pretti’s murder and 2 in 3 Americans saying ICE enforcement has gone too far.

As public approval of ICE rises amid fear-driven rhetoric and misleading narratives, the stakes of immigration coverage have never been higher. ICE is exercising sweeping power over people’s lives—through raids, detention, surveillance, and use of force—often with devastating consequences for families, workers, and entire communities. This is not a marginal policy debate; it is a core issue of civil rights and state power. This framing strips away context, minimizes documented abuses, and fails to interrogate how enforcement tactics impact U.S. citizens, legal residents, and vulnerable communities.

🖊️ Add your name to call on news organizations to cover ICE more aggressively by centering investigative reporting, amplifying affected voices, scrutinizing agency claims, and clearly documenting harms caused by enforcement practices. Journalism’s role is not to normalize power, but to challenge it. The public deserves coverage that reflects the gravity, scale, and consequences of ICE’s actions—not sanitized narratives that leave abuse unexamined.

Read about this, and more, with today’s stories:

Poll: Two-thirds of Americans say ICE has 'gone too far' in immigration enforcement (NPR)

Transcript: Trump Hints at Panic over ICE as Camps Anger MAGA Country (The New Republic)

ICE’s Private Prison Contractors Spent Millions Lobbying to Force Banks to Give Them Loans (The Intercept)

“You’re Not Going to Investigate a Federal Officer” (ProPublica)

Epstein files rife with uncensored nudes and victims’ names, despite redaction efforts (AP News)

Expiration of U.S.-Russia nuclear weapons treaty sparks concerns of new arms race (PBS News)

Kristi Noem’s Throttling of FEMA Funds Constitutes a Preventable Disaster (Mother Jones)

Michigan accuses big oil of being ‘cartel’ that fuels climate crisis and high energy costs (The Guardian)

The Plot to Privatize Veteran Brain Care (The American Prospect)

Utah lawmakers sweep their own study on care for trans kids under the rug as they push to ban it (The 19th)

Searching for dinosaur secrets in crocodile bones (NPR)

Until next time,

Harry from The Hound

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