When Kris Olsson learned that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement had flights at Willow Run Airport, she knew that she had to do something to bring attention to the transport of shackled people at a location close to home. After Donald Trump became president in January 2025, airplanes carrying immigrants started to fly through two airports in Michigan, mostly at Willow Run in Ypsilanti and Van Buren townships, and a smaller number at Detroit Metro Airport in Romulus.
"When people are kidnapped off the streets by ICE ... it's very difficult for lawyers and family members to find out where they're being taken," Olsson, of Ann Arbor, told the Detroit Free Press. "We don't know who the people are by name, but we can take pictures (at the airports).
... With people being transported against their will all over the country, really violating their rights, we wanted to bring that to light."
Starting in November 2025, Olsson and other advocates documented in person about a dozen ICE flights through Willow Run Airport, taking photos and notes of what they said they witnessed. What she saw broke her heart: men and women shackled at the wrists and ankles being led out of large vans and buses on the tarmac and led upstairs into waiting airplanes, usually on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays.
But when Olsson returned on April 8, she said, the longtime ecologist was threatened with arrest by security officers with the Wayne County Airport Authority, which handles operations at the airport, after she tried to observe and take photographs of ICE flights and U.S. Border Patrol vans. Olsson maintains she was on public roads and property, but an officer told her she was trespassing on private property and was a "protester" who didn't have the right to document the flights. Olsson said she wasn't protesting, just observing. A spokesman for the Wayne County Airport Authority, Matt Morawski, told the Free Press the authority is reviewing her claims and can't comment while they're under review.
The dispute between Olsson and the airport authority comes as ICE flights through Willow Run have jumped 70% so far this year compared to all of 2025, a spike that's expected to increase in coming months, according to data on ICE flights through the end of September provided by Human Rights First. In 2024, the final year of President Joe Biden's term, there were no ICE flights at Willow Run or any other Michigan airport. In 2025, there were 87 ICE flights at Willow Run, with 148 this year from Jan. 1 through Sept. 30, 2026. With more ICE flights expected in the final three months of 2026, the 70% increase this year will rise even further by Dec. 31, advocates said. If the current pace continues, the number of ICE flights at Willow Run will at least double compared to 2025.
"The ICE air network is what we kind of call it," Olsson said. "They often will pick them up and transport them from airport to airport, and then from detention place to detention place, and they kind of keep them on the move as a way both to demoralize them so they will self deport, but also to keep their attorneys ... families from finding them. And so our observations are one way to try to keep track of them."
Coalition asks Wayne County to pass resolution
Olsson and others with the Coalition to Shut the Camps, a Michigan advocacy group opposed to immigration detention centers, voiced their concerns at a Wayne County Airport Authority board meeting last month on Sept. 16, asking the officials for more transparency. On Sept. 30, coalition members met with Wayne County Airport Authority CEO Chad Newton to discuss in detail their concerns and requests. They're asking the board to approve a resolution at their upcoming Oct. 28 meeting that says the public has the right to photograph and document the flights. And they would like a website similar to one created by King County in Washington state, where there are cameras set up at an airport with a live feed allowing the public to view airplanes along with a log of all ICE flights.
King County includes the city of Seattle and the airport that can be viewed online is King County International Airport-Boeing Field, which ICE often uses. In 2023, the King County executive ordered that the airport maintain a log of ICE flights and have cameras, providing a feed the public can view online through a livestream "to provide visibility of ICE flight operations," King County said. The order was reaffirmed in 2026.
Morawski did not comment on the coalition's requests, citing their respsonses and a board resolution passed earlier this year. The board approved a resolution in February that allows flights containing immigrant detainees to continue flying into and out of Willow Run and nearby Detroit Metro Airport. The board added that it lacks legal standing to prevent them.
"The Wayne County Airport Authority will continue to cooperate with federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies," read part of the resolution, approved 7-0.
"Our hands are tied," Michael Ajami, the board's chair at the time, told the Free Press earlier this year. "We're hamstrung. … We can't tell charters to, or to not, do business with anybody, based on FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) regulations and grants."
Ajami's term expired earlier and he no longer sits on the board; previous board members Dennis Archer Jr. and Athena Papis also have left because their terms expired, Morawski said. According to the authority's website, the seven-member board currently has six members: Lisa Canada, Marvin Beatty, Saju George, Wayne County Commissioner Joseph Palamara, former Wayne County Commissioner Abdul "Al" Haidous and Paul Lee. Among the seven members of the board, four members are appointed by the Wayne County executive, two members are appointed by the governor and one member is appointed by the Wayne County Commission.
The activists have the support of several teachers and students with the Civil Rights Litigation Initiative at the University of Michigan Law School in Ann Arbor, including its director, Michael Steinberg, the former legal director of ACLU Michigan. The U-M group, which reprents Olsson, sent a letter last month on Sept. 14 detailing Olsonn's experiences to Newton, seven board members and an employee at the Wayne County Airport Authority.
"She believed that many Michiganders, who pride themselves on their welcoming Midwestern spirit, would be appalled to see such treatment in their own backyard," the letter reads. "These observations reinforced for Ms. Olsson the importance of documenting ICE flights and raising public awareness of the agency’s activities at Willow Run."
Advocate allegedly threatened with arrest
The letter described Olsson's encounter on April 8 with Wayne County Airport security when she drove there to observe ICE airplanes.
"After turning off Ecorse Road, she passed the Michigan Flight Museum and entered D Street, a small ungatedroad with no signs restricting public access," the letter said. "Farther along, she spotted a private parking lot witha 'No Trespassing' sign, and, careful not to enter a prohibited area, turned around."
Areas at Willow Run that are prohibited from the public are separated by large fences with "No Trespassing" signs. Olsson said she noted these signs and did not attempt to enter the gated areas, remaining on public roads. She "stopped in a small, unrestricted parking lot, where she exited her vehicle and captured images of the planes on the tarmac."
A Wayne County Airport Authority officer then approached her and told her she was trespassing, Olsson said. Olsson asked where the "No Trespassing" signs were and then returned to her car and left, the letter said.
Olsson then drove to the nearby Michigan Flight Museum, parked her car, and began walking around the museum property.
"The officer again confronted her — this time accompanied by a WCAA security guard — and told her that the airport was private property," the letter said.
The officer accused her of being a protester and "threatened to arrest Ms. Olsson if she did not leave. Faced with that threat, Ms. Olsson complied."
The legal team alleges that Wayne County officers violated her constitutional rights.
"Olsson’s First Amendment-protected activity took place on public streets that have long been recognized as traditional public forums, warranting heightened First Amendment protections," they wrote.
ICE flights increase at Michigan airport
The 148 ICE flights at Willow Run includes inbound domestic shuffle flights and removal connections, which refers to two flights on deportation routes, said Human Rights First. The data shows an increase in the number of flights per month in 2026: There were 12 ICE flights at Willow Run in January, 13 in February, 15 in March, 16 in April, 17 in May, 14 in June, 20 in July, 22 in August and 19 in September.
"Notably, there were no ICE Air flights to Michigan prior to 2025, at least since flight tracking began in 2020," said Sierra Randolph, a data manager at Human Rights First.
In addition to Willow Run, there have been 14 ICE flights at Detroit Metro Airport since Jan. 1, 2025: 11 in 2025 and 3 in 2026 through Sept. 30.
Contact Niraj Warikoo: nwarikoo@freepress.com, X @nwarikoo, or Facebook @nwarikoo
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: ICE flights rise 70% as advocates ask Wayne County for transparency
