The Michigan Immigrant Rights Center has been forced to lay off 72 staff members due to federal funding cuts.
The Trump administration has ended federal support for two of the Center’s key programs: an immigration help desk in Detroit federal court, and legal support for unaccompanied migrant children, despite ongoing litigation and court orders to maintain funding.
“On Thursday, April 10, 2025, the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center (MIRC) learned that funding for the Immigration Court Helpdesk Program was terminated, despite litigation protecting the program after a January “stop work order,” the organization said in a release on Monday. “In addition, MIRC continues to deal with the consequences of a March 21, 2025, termination of its contract to provide immigration legal services to children in and released from federal custody in Michigan. Despite a temporary restraining order restoring the contract that has been in place since March 27th, the government had not as of Friday, April 11th actually complied with the court’s order and no contract for continued services was in place.”
MIRC spokesperson Christine Sauve said the group maintained those services for as long as it could. “We did wait to see if the administration would follow the court orders, and they have not, and it just became financially untenable to continue,” she said.
Sauve said the immigration help desk program will continue in various locations outside the courthouse for now, and MIRC will continue working on the cases of unaccompanied minor children it’s already representing--but won’t take any new child clients.
“The staff layoff notice comes at a time when children need attorneys the most,” MIRC stated. “The Trump administration is accelerating removal proceedings – using a so-called “rocket docket” – to push children through our nation’s deportation system at an alarming rate, depriving them of due process and protections against trafficking and abuse.”
“Overall, with the loss of the federal funding for both of these programs, it's a major setback for due process and access to legal services for immigrants in Michigan,” added Sauve.
MIRC has represented more than 800 children in immigration court proceedings, the youngest a 10-month-old baby. Otherwise, Sauve said the group’s work will “continue with 49 staff distributed at five offices throughout the state.”
