Standing gap: DHS's binding PREA regulation still contains transgender-specific protections that ICE practice no longer follows

DHS's immigration-detention PREA regulation has not been amended since December 22, 2016 — the amendment date recorded for every section of Part 115 in the Code of Federal Regulations as of August 2026 — and a search of Federal Register documents referencing 6 CFR Part 115 published on or after January 20, 2025 returns no results. The regulation therefore continues to require, among other things, that security staff be trained in "searches of transgender and intersex detainees," that staff communicate effectively and professionally with "lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, or gender nonconforming detainees," and that intake assessments consider whether a detainee has self-identified as transgender, intersex, or gender nonconforming. DHS likewise published no rulemaking amending 6 CFR Part 17 (its Title IX sex-discrimination regulation) in this period. The consequence is legally significant: the transgender-specific rollback in immigration detention was accomplished sub-regulatorily — through contract modifications, revised detention standards, and internal memoranda (section 7) — while the binding regulation remained on the books, and simultaneously the offices that would enforce the regulation's complaint and oversight requirements were eliminated or reduced to a handful of staff.