Our Story

Indiana AID was formed in 2019 when three individuals - a lawyer, a grad student, and a pastor - came together out of our mutual concern over the fact that there was no program in Indiana to support the immigrants who were detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in our state. Although several coalitions were forming around that time to support immigration reform, there were no groups in Indiana that were directly connecting with people who experienced immigration detention. We believed that it was essential to connect immigrants themselves with the larger Indiana community that wanted to support them.

Fortunately, we knew about organizations in other states who had formed visitation programs like ours, and they helped us get our program started. Shalom Mennonite Church in Indianapolis allowed us to launch our program under its supervision, and we submitted a formal request to ICE to visit the facility in early 2020. Unfortunately, our plans were thwarted when the COVID-19 pandemic arrived and all in-person visitation was shut down. For the next year and a half, we gathered as much information as we could about the jail but we struggled to make any connections with the people who were frequently moved in and out of there.

We experienced a major breakthrough in 2021 when we learned from our out-of-state partners that the Clay County jail made a contract with a private company called Securus Technologies, which allowed detained immigrants to video conference with friends and family at exorbitant rates. Although we had reservations about providing financial support to this exploitative company, we took advantage of the pathway it created for us to reach detained immigrants. We raised the funds to pay for video calls on our end and started reaching out to the immigrants in the jail and offering to listen to their stories and offer support where possible. This generated significant interest, and we began establishing relationships in both of the cell blocks at the jail that held immigrants

In 2022, the jail finally acknowledged the end of the COVID-19 emergency and allowed us to come in through the Community Stakeholder request. We met the local sheriff, jail commander, ICE representative, and a few other staff members, and they gave us permission to begin an in-person Bible study program, which we offer on the first Saturday of every month. As we got to know the community better, we expanded our programming and our resources, and we now offer books, commissary funds, and a few other resources to all of the immigrants whom we encounter.

Finally, it’s important to acknowledge the shifts that have occurred since 2024. In 2024, the Clay County Council signed an agreement with the US government to expand their ICE detention wing, which went from having two cells and a maximum of about 60 people to having 10 cells and a maximum of about 300 people (which it periodically exceeds). This was partially a response to the decision made by the state of Illinois to end ICE detention and the government’s perceived need to create more detention locations in the midwest. We celebrate this decision by the state of Illinois, but one of the unfortunate effects was that it led to one of our largest and closest partner organizations - the Interfaith Community for Detained Immigrants, based in Chicago - to end its visitation program. This means that we are now the only active visitation group in the Chicago immigration “circuit” and we have a much bigger responsibility than we did even a few years ago. In other words, we need your help!