At its peak this fiscal year, the center had exceeded its ICE capacity by more than 200 at 462, making it among the 10 most-overcrowded immigration facilities out of the nation's 180 ICE detention centers.

Health care providers have brought back telehealth visits as ramped-up immigration enforcement drives patients without legal status deeper into the shadows.

Although no place in Nevada identifies as “a sanctuary jurisdiction”, the immigration-focused attacks on Ford highlight both the murkiness of the “sanctuary” label and the shifting opinion on state roles in immigration enforcement throughout Ford’s decade-plus in elected office.

The 10-page timeline, shared exclusively with The Nevada Independent, reveals a variety of previously unreported actions taken by the Lombardo administration to crack down on people in the state illegally.

The freshly released data — based on national immigration statistics — shows that the number of people in the United States illegally surged to an all-time high of 14 million in 2023, a major increase that still fell well short of estimates from President Donald Trump and some immigration critics who say that number is closer to 20 million.

The designation has made Nevada colleges eligible for grants exclusive to Hispanic-Serving Institutions, such as a nearly $3 million, five-year “Math Map” grant for the College of Southern Nevada aimed at helping students succeed in college math.

Critics worry the policy will allow for more subjective views of what is anti-American and allow an officer's personal bias to cloud his or her judgment.

President Donald Trump issued an order to exclude immigrants who are in the United States illegally from the U.S. Census Bureau last week. Experts say that could impact how federal aid is distributed to Nevada.

In the Thursday lawsuit, the ACLU said the DMV had failed to turn over correspondence between the agency and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in response to multiple public records requests since February 2025. After sending a formal demand letter through the Nevada Attorney General’s Office, the Nevada DMV turned over heavily redacted and incomplete documents.

It’s unclear if the Office for New Americans is the reason for the label. Gov. Joe Lombardo’s office has previously pushed back against the sanctuary designation and said they have repeatedly reached out to the Department of Justice.

Such a deployment of troops — whose responsibilities typically include responding to natural disasters or helping with overseas missions — marks a drastic escalation of their prior use as it relates to immigration enforcement. Using the national guard often hinges on the explicit consent of a state’s governor, and the extent of their work in assisting ICE is decided by each state’s governor.

A statement provided by the office of Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV), who is a member of the Senate Travel and Tourism Caucus, said “travel bonds will cause significant harm to the already-hurting travel and tourism economy in Nevada and across the country."

The designation could have massive implications in Nevada, which has one of the highest shares of undocumented people in the nation. A recent executive order directed the Justice Department to “identify appropriate Federal funds to sanctuary jurisdictions, including grants and contracts, for suspension or termination.”

Broadacres Marketplace prepared for its reopening this weekend with the support of legal experts, the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada and other groups to make the swap meet a place that is “safer, stronger, and more informed.”

Through the end of June, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has arrested about 48 people in Nevada weekly, more than four times the weekly average in the final 16 months of President Joe Biden’s administration.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials will be given access to the personal data of the nation’s 79 million Medicaid enrollees, including home addresses and ethnicities, to track down immigrants who may not be living legally in the United States.

Although the bill did not outline where the money would go in Nevada, lawyers and immigrant advocacy groups say they are preparing for an increase in ICE arrests and presence.

The termination, which has not been previously reported in the media, follows years of concerns from progressive groups, that the Nye County Detention Center was mistreating prisoners.

Lawmakers observed that detainees had access to medical services and working phones, and that the majority of individuals were housed in shared dormitories rather than individual cells.

There are more than 5,000 TPS holders in Nevada, according to the National Immigration Forum, although the group did not estimate how many of those are from Nicaragua and Honduras.