WASHINGTON — President Trump will visit a new immigration detention facility in the Florida Everglades on Tuesday, showcasing his border crackdown in the face of humanitarian and environmental concerns.
The trip was confirmed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Monday.
“When the president comes tomorrow, he’s going to be able to see,” DeSantis told reporters. He added that “I think by tomorrow, it’ll be ready for business.”
The governor, who unsuccessfully challenged Trump for the Republican presidential nomination last year, said he spoke with Trump over the weekend. He also said the site obtained approval from the Department of Homeland Security.
“What’ll happen is you bring people in there,” DeSantis said during an unrelated press conference in Wildwood. “They ain’t going anywhere once they’re there, unless you want them to go somewhere, because good luck getting to civilization. So the security is amazing.”
The facility has drawn protests over its potential impact on the delicate ecosystem and criticism that Trump is trying to send a cruel message to immigrants. Some Native American leaders have also opposed construction, saying the land is sacred.
The detention facility is being built on an isolated airstrip about 50 miles west of Miami, and it could house 5,000 detainees. The surrounding swampland is filled with mosquitos, pythons and alligators.
“There’s really nowhere to go. If you’re housed there, if you’re detained there, there’s no way in, no way out,” Florida Atty. Gen. James Uthmeier told conservative media commentator Benny Johnson.
He’s described the facility as “Alligator Alcatraz,” a moniker embraced by the Trump administration. DHS posted an image of alligators wearing hats with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s acronym.
State officials in Florida are spearheading construction but much of the cost is being covered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, which is best known for responding to hurricanes and other natural disasters.
Gomez Licon reported from Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Megerian and Licon write for the Associated Press.
Between delicately assembling a pair of open-faced sandwiches in her comfortably stocked kitchen and carefully picking her wardrobe for an incoming visitor, Ruth (Kathleen Chalfant), an elegant older woman with intelligent eyes and a wry smile, looks like someone who enjoys hosting. Flirting too, if the hand she gently places on her lunch companion’s knee is any indication.
But there are signs that Ruth, an accomplished cookbook author, exists apart from the reality of the moment. Polite, patient, nervous Steve (H. Jon Benjamin) is not a date — he’s actually Ruth’s son, there to take her to a well-appointed retirement community where she’ll live under the observation of caregivers who specialize in memory care. But also, thanks to the power of “Familiar Touch,” it’s a place where she’ll be affectionately dimensionalized through the encouraging eyes of the filmmaker who created her, Sarah Friedland.
Friedland’s acute debut feature, drawn from her experience in the memory-care field, is a small miracle of realigned empathy, turning away from the condescension and easy sentiment of so many narratives about late-in-life adaptation. Instead it finds something infinitely more layered and meaningful, especially where Chalfant’s utterly commanding characterization is concerned.
Friedland doesn’t waste time letting us know she has more on her mind than rote family drama or a spotlight on medical suffering. The quiet car ride to the senior living home is marked by a closeup of Ruth’s hand turning on her lap as it’s warmed by the sun — a moment meant to prioritize Ruth’s sensorial experience. In the facility’s lobby, where we meet kindly caregiver Vanessa (Carolyn Michelle) and Ruth realizes she’s not at a hotel for a rendezvous but rather to be admitted to a new group home by a grown child she doesn’t recognize, the moment is as tension-filled as it needs to be.
Yet even that is offset by the composed normality of Friedland’s unhurried, attentive direction, seeding an understanding that what is new for Ruth (or new once more, since we learn that she herself had chosen the place in less-confused times) is, in practically every other way, a common occurrence. This is a rite of passage happening all the time everywhere and deserving of compassion.
Ruth’s awareness is fluid as she becomes accustomed to a life of assistance, tests, activities, neighbors and the unique connection between resident and caregiver. As the process unfolds, “Familiar Touch” reveals itself as a social procedural about a demanding healthcare profession, often staffed by people who can’t afford to place their own loved ones in such facilities. The movie demystifies what’s hard and rewarding about caregiving, thanks largely to Michelle’s incredible, nuanced turn as Vanessa. That thread is exquisitely interlocked with a sensitive, sharp portrait of the interiority of someone searching for agency while in the throes of dementia.
Friedland never ignores what’s upsetting about Ruth’s condition, especially the loneliness that might replace sleep in an unfamiliar bed, or the despair that triggers a nighttime escape. But by sticking to Ruth’s perspective, the camera attuned to every emergence of childlike glee, adult pleasure or sharp-witted flash of authority, we come to see a person, not a patient. Ruth’s swings of emotion and identity are multitudes to be uncovered and respected.
The mystery of Ruth’s mindfulness — which ebbs and flows — is at the core of Chalfant’s brilliant, award-worthy performance. Hers is a virtuosity that doesn’t ask for pity or applause or even link arms with the stricken-but-defiant disease-playing headliners who have gone before her. Chalfant’s Ruth is merely, momentously human: an older woman in need, but no less expressive of life’s fullness because of it. It’s a portrayal to remember, for as long as any of us can.
‘Familiar Touch’
Not rated
Running time: 1 hour, 30 minutes
Playing: Opens Friday, June 27, at Laemmle Royal, West Los Angeles; Laemmle Town Center, Encino; Laemmle Glendale
WASHINGTON — Just hours after she pleaded not guilty to federal charges brought by the Trump administration, Rep. LaMonica McIver of New Jersey was surrounded by dozens of supportive Democratic colleagues in the halls of the Capitol. The case, they argued, strikes at the heart of congressional power.
“If they can break LaMonica, they can break the House of Representatives,” said New York Rep. Yvette D. Clarke, chair of the Congressional Black Caucus.
Federal prosecutors allege that McIver interfered with law enforcement during a visit with two other House Democrats to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Newark. She calls the charges “baseless.”
It’s far from the only clash between congressional Democrats and the Republican administration as officials ramp up deportations of immigrants around the country.
Sen. Alex Padilla of California was forcibly removed by federal agents, wrestled to the ground and held while attempting to ask a question at a news conference of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. At least six groups of House Democrats have recently been denied entry to ICE detention centers. In early June, federal agents entered the district office of Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) and briefly detained a staffer.
Congressional Republicans have largely criticized Democrats’ behavior as inflammatory and inappropriate, and some have publicly supported the prosecution of McIver.
Often in the dark about the Trump administration’s moves, congressional Democrats are wrestling with how to perform their oversight duties at a time of roiling tensions with the White House and new restrictions on lawmakers visiting federal facilities.
“We have the authority to conduct oversight business, and clearly, House Republicans are not doing that oversight here,” said New Jersey Rep. Rob Menendez, one of the House Democrats who went with McIver to the Newark ICE facility.
“It’s our obligation to continue to do it on-site at these detention facilities. And even if they don’t want us to, we are going to continue to exert our right.”
A stark new reality
The prospect of facing charges for once routine oversight activity has alarmed many congressional Democrats who never expected to face criminal prosecution as elected officials. Lawmakers in both parties were also unnerved by the recent targeted shootings of two Minnesota lawmakers — one of them fatal — and the nation’s tense political atmosphere.
“It’s a moment that calls for personal courage of members of Congress,” said Rep. Summer Lee (D-Pa.). “I wish that we had more physical protection. I think that’s one of those harsh realities that members of Congress who are not in leadership recognize: that oftentimes, we do this job at our own peril, and we do it anyway.”
The arrests and detentions of lawmakers have led some Democrats to take precautionary measures. Several have consulted with the House general counsel about their right to conduct oversight. Multiple lawmakers also sought personal legal counsel, while others have called for a review of congressional rules to provide greater protections.
“The Capitol Police are the security force for members of Congress. We need them to travel with us, to go to facilities and events that the president may have us arrested for,” said Rep. Jonathan Jackson (D-Ill.).
‘Not a lot of transparency’
As the minority party in the House, Democrats lack the subpoena power to force the White House to provide information. That’s a problem, they say, because the Trump administration is unusually secretive about its actions.
“There’s not a lot of transparency. From day to day, oftentimes, we’re learning about what’s happening at the same time as the rest of the nation,” said Rep. Lucy McBath (D-Ga.), who led a prayer for McIver at the Capitol rally.
To amplify their concerns, Democrats have turned to public letters, confronted officials at congressional hearings and used digital and media outreach to try to create public pressure.
“We’ve been very successful when they come in before committees,” said Rep. Lauren Underwood (D-Ill.), who added that she believed the public inquiries have “100%” resonated with voters.
Tapping into the information pipeline
Congressional Democrats say they often rely on local lawmakers, business leaders and advocates to be their eyes and ears on the ground.
A few Democrats say their best sources of information are across the political aisle, since Republicans typically have clearer lines of communication with the White House.
“I know who to call in Houston with the chamber. I think all of us do that,” Rep. Sylvia Garcia (D-Texas) said of how business leaders are keeping her updated.
Garcia said Democrats “need to put more pressure” on leading figures in the agriculture, restaurant and hospitality sectors to take their concerns about the immigrant crackdown to President Trump’s White House.
“They’re the ones he’ll listen to. They’re the ones who can add the pressure. He’s not going to listen to me, a Democrat who was an impeachment manager, who is on the bottom of his list, if I’m on it at all,” Garcia said.
Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colo.) had a working relationship with a for-profit ICE facility in his district until the Department of Homeland Security in February ended reports as part of an agency-wide policy change. A member of Crow’s staff now regularly goes to the facility and waits, at times for hours, until staff at the Aurora facility respond to detailed questions posed by the office.
‘Real oversight’ requires winning elections
Still, many House Democrats concede that they can conduct little of their desired oversight until they are back in the majority.
Rep. Marc Veasey (D-Texas) said that “real oversight power and muscle” only comes “when you have a gavel.”
“Nothing else matters. No rousing oratory, no tours, no speeches, no social media or entertainment, none of that stuff,” Veasey said. “Because the thing that keeps Trump up at night more than anything else is the idea he’s going to lose this House and there’ll be real oversight pressure applied to him.”
A coalition of groups including environmental activists and Native Americans advocating for their ancestral homelands converged outside an airstrip in the Florida Everglades on Saturday to protest the imminent construction of an immigrant detention center.
Hundreds of protesters lined part of U.S. Highway 41 that slices through the marshy Everglades — also known as Tamiami Trail — as dump trucks hauling materials lumbered into the airfield. Cars passing by honked in support as protesters waved signs calling for the protection of the expansive preserve that is home to a few Native tribes and several endangered animal species.
Christopher McVoy, an ecologist, said he saw a steady stream of trucks entering the site while he protested for hours. Environmental degradation was a big reason why he came out Saturday. But as a south Florida city commissioner, he said concerns over immigration raids in his city also fueled his opposition.
“People I know are in tears, and I wasn’t far from it,” he said.
Florida officials have forged ahead over the last week in constructing the compound dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz” within the Everglades’ humid swamplands.
The government fast-tracked the project under emergency powers from an executive order issued by Gov. Ron DeSantis that addresses what he casts as a crisis of illegal immigration. That order lets the state sidestep certain purchasing laws and is why construction has continued despite objections from Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava and local activists.
The facility will have temporary structures such as heavy-duty tents and trailers to house detained immigrants. The state estimates that by early July, it will have 5,000 immigration detention beds in operation.
The compound’s proponents have said its location in the Florida wetlands — teeming with alligators, invasive Burmese pythons and other reptiles — makes it an ideal spot for immigration detention.
“Clearly, from a security perspective, if someone escapes, you know, there’s a lot of alligators,” DeSantis said Wednesday. “No one’s going anywhere.”
Under DeSantis, Florida has made an aggressive push for immigration enforcement and has been supportive of the federal government’s broader crackdown on illegal immigration. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has backed Alligator Alcatraz, which Secretary Kristi Noem said will be partly funded by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
Native American leaders in the region have seen the construction as an encroachment onto their sacred homelands, which prompted Saturday’s protest. In Big Cypress National Preserve, where the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport is located, 15 traditional Miccosukee and Seminole villages remain, as well as ceremonial and burial grounds and other gathering sites.
Others have raised human rights concerns over what they condemn as the inhumane housing of immigrants. Worries about environmental effects have also been at the forefront, as groups such as the Center for Biological Diversity and the Friends of the Everglades filed a lawsuit Friday to halt the detention center plans.
“The Everglades is a vast, interconnected system of waterways and wetlands, and what happens in one area can have damaging impacts downstream,” Friends of the Everglades executive director Eve Samples said. “So it’s really important that we have a clear sense of any wetland impacts happening in the site.”
Bryan Griffin, a DeSantis spokesperson, said Friday in response to the litigation that the facility was a “necessary staging operation for mass deportations located at a preexisting airport that will have no impact on the surrounding environment.”
Until the site undergoes a comprehensive environmental review and public comment is sought, the environmental groups say construction should pause. The facility’s speedy establishment is “damning evidence” that state and federal agencies hope it will be “too late” to reverse their actions if they are ordered by a court to do so, said Elise Bennett, a Center for Biological Diversity senior attorney working on the case.
The potential environmental hazards also bleed into other aspects of Everglades life, including a robust tourism industry where hikers walk trails and explore the marshes on airboats, said Floridians for Public Lands founder Jessica Namath, who attended the protest. To place an immigration detention center there makes the area unwelcoming to visitors and feeds into the misconception that the space is in “the middle of nowhere,” she said.
“Everybody out here sees the exhaust fumes, sees the oil slicks on the road, you know, they hear the sound and the noise pollution. You can imagine what it looks like at nighttime, and we’re in an international dark sky area,” Namath said. “It’s very frustrating because, again, there’s such disconnect for politicians.”
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Florida officials are pursuing plans to build a second detention center to house immigrants, as part of the state’s aggressive push to support the federal government’s crackdown on illegal immigration.
Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis said Wednesday he’s considering establishing a facility at a Florida National Guard training center known as Camp Blanding, about 30 miles southwest of Jacksonville in northeast Florida, in addition to the site under construction at a remote airstrip in the Everglades that state officials have dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz.”
The construction of that facility in the remote and ecologically sensitive wetland about 45 miles west of downtown Miami is alarming environmentalists, as well as human rights advocates who have slammed the plan as cruel and inhumane.
Speaking to reporters at an event in Tampa, DeSantis touted the state’s muscular approach to immigration enforcement and its willingness to help President Trump’s administration meet its goal of more than doubling its existing 41,000 beds for detaining migrants to at least 100,000 beds.
State officials have said the detention facility, which has been described as temporary, will rely on heavy-duty tents, trailers, and other impermanent buildings, allowing the state to operationalize 5,000 immigration detention beds by early July and free up space in local jails.
“I think the capacity that will be added there will help the overall national mission. It will also relieve some burdens of our state and local [law enforcement],” DeSantis said.
Managing the facility “via a team of vendors” will cost $245 a bed per day, or approximately $450 million a year, a U.S. official said. The expenses will be incurred by Florida and reimbursed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
In the eyes of DeSantis and other state officials, the remoteness of the Everglades airfield, surrounded by mosquito- and alligator-filled wetlands that are seen as sacred to Native American tribes, makes it an ideal place to detain migrants.
“Clearly, from a security perspective, if someone escapes, you know, there’s a lot of alligators,” he said. “No one’s going anywhere.”
Democrats and activists have condemned the plan as a callous, politically motivated spectacle.
“What’s happening is very concerning, the level of dehumanization,” said Maria Asuncion Bilbao, Florida campaign coordinator at the immigration advocacy group American Friends Service Committee.
“It’s like a theatricalization of cruelty,” she said.
DeSantis is relying on state emergency powers to commandeer the county-owned airstrip and build the compound, over the concerns of county officials, environmentalists and human rights advocates.
Now the state is considering standing up another site at a National Guard training facility in northeast Florida as well.
“We’ll probably also do something similar up at Camp Blanding,” DeSantis said, adding that the state’s emergency management division is “working on that.”
NEWARK, N.J. — U.S. Rep. LaMonica McIver pleaded not guilty Wednesday to federal charges accusing her of assaulting and interfering with immigration officers outside a New Jersey detention center during a congressional oversight visit at the facility.
“They will not intimidate me. They will not stop me from doing my job,” she said outside the courthouse in Newark after the brief hearing.
McIver, a Democrat, was charged by interim U.S. Atty. Alina Habba, a Republican appointed by President Trump, following the May 9 visit to Newark’s Delaney Hall. Immigration and Customs Enforcement uses the privately owned, 1,000-bed facility as a detention center.
This month she was indicted on three counts of assaulting, resisting, impeding and interfering with federal officials. Two of the counts carry a maximum sentence of up to eight years in prison. The third is a misdemeanor with a maximum punishment of one year in prison.
During Wednesday’s hearing, McIver stood and told U.S. District Judge Jamel Semper: “Your honor, I plead not guilty.” The judge set a Nov. 10 trial date.
Outside the courthouse, McIver warned that anyone who pushes back against the Trump administration will find themselves in a similar position.
McIver’s lawyer, former U.S. Attorney for New Jersey Paul Fishman, said McIver pleaded not guilty because she is not guilty. He said federal agents created a risky situation at Delaney Hall.
A message seeking comment Wednesday was left with Habba’s office.
Among those at McIver’s side Wednesday were her family and elected officials, including Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, who was outside the detention center with McIver and other legislators on May 9.
Baraka was also arrested on a trespassing charge that was later dropped and is suing Habba over what he called a malicious prosecution.
Baraka accused the Trump administration of using law enforcement as “an appendage of their ideology to begin to hammer us.”
The indictment of McIver is the latest development in a legal-political drama that has seen the Trump administration take Democratic officials from New Jersey’s largest city to court amid the president’s ongoing immigration crackdown and Democrats’ efforts to respond. The prosecution is a rare federal criminal case against a sitting member of Congress for allegations other than fraud or corruption.
A nearly two-minute video clip released by the Department of Homeland Security shows McIver at the facility inside a chain-link fence just before Baraka’s arrest on other side of the barrier, where other people were protesting. McIver and uniformed officials go through the gate, and she joins others shouting that they should circle the mayor.
The video shows McIver in a tightly packed group of people and officers. At one point her left elbow and then her right elbow push into an officer wearing a dark face covering and an olive green uniform emblazoned with the word “Police.”
It is not clear from police bodycam video if the contact was intentional, incidental or the result of jostling in the chaotic scene.
The complaint alleges that she “slammed” her forearm into an agent and then tried to restrain the agent by grabbing him.
The indictment also says she placed her arms around the mayor to try to stop his arrest and says again that she slammed her forearm into and grabbed an agent.
Democrats including New Jersey Reps. Bonnie Watson Coleman and Rob Menendez, who were with McIver at the detention center that day, have criticized the arrest and disputed the charges.
Members of Congress are legally authorized to go into federal immigration facilities as part of their oversight powers, even without notice. Congress passed a 2019 appropriations bill spelling out that authority.
McIver, 39, first came to Congress in September in a special election after the death of Rep. Donald Payne Jr. left a vacancy in the 10th District. She was then elected to a full term in November.
A Newark native, she was president of the Newark City Council from 2022 to 2024 and worked in the city’s public schools before that.
When she made it back inside the privately run facility in the Mojave desert last week, things weren’t much better.
“It is just scandalous as to how it has not improved,” she told me.
Truth be told, conditions are likely to get worse, if only because of sheer numbers and chaos. Which makes it all the more important to have elected leaders like Chu willing to put themselves on the front lines to give a voice to the truly, really voiceless.
Shortly after the unannounced visit to Adelanto by Chu and four other members of Congress a few days ago, ICE announced new rules attempting to further limit access by lawmakers to its facilities — despite clear federal law allowing them unannounced entrance to such lockups. While Chu and others have called these new curbs on access illegal, they are still likely to be enforced until and unless courts rule otherwise.
The narrow, fragile line of the judicial branch is holding, for now.
But families and even lawyers are struggling to keep track of those who vanish into these facilities, many of which — including Adelanto — are operated by private, for-profit companies raking in millions of dollars from the government.
When the Trump administration started its attack on Los Angeles a few weeks ago, Chu started receiving calls from her constituents asking for help. She represents Altadena, Pasadena and other areas where there are large populations of immigrants, and as the daughter of an immigrant, she relates.
Her mom came here from China as a 19-year-old bride. Chu’s dad was born in the United States.
“I feel such a heavy responsibility to change things for them, to change things for the better,” she said. “I am surrounded by immigrants every day. This is a district of immigrants. My relatives are immigrants. My friends are immigrants. Yes, my life is immigrants.”
A few days ago, she tried to visit the Metropolitan Detention Center in downtown Los Angeles, where many of the recent protests have been focused, and where many of the people detained in Los Angeles have reportedly been held at first. She’d heard that even though it’s not meant to be more than a stopover, folks have been staying there longer.
“The fact that these raids are so severe, so massive, it just seems very obvious to me that they would not be treating the detainees in a humane way. And that’s what I wanted to find out,” she told me.
But no luck. Authorities turned her away at the door.
So a few days later she decided to show up unannounced — which is her right as a federal lawmaker — at Adelanto.
Guess what: No luck.
Officers there chained the gate shut, she said, and wouldn’t even talk to her.
“To actually just be locked out like that was unbelievable,” she said. “We shouted that we were members of Congress. We held signs up saying that we were members of Congress, and in fact, there was a car parked only a few feet away inside the facility. The job of that person was just to watch us. Wow.”
Wow indeed.
Undeterred, she came back a few days later when the gate was unlocked. This time, she drove straight inside, not asking permission.
Her staff “deliberately dropped me off inside the lobby before they knew that we were there,” she said.
She got out at the front door and was granted entry.
“The ICE agent said, ‘Oh, well, we thought you were protesters the time before,’” she said. “And that cannot be true, you know, considering all of our yelling and signs. But anyway.”
She was armed with the names of people from her district who had been detained, and she asked to see them. She got to speak to some of them, but everyone wanted her help. At the start of the year, Adelanto held only a handful of people, having been nearly closed by a court order during COVID-19. Now it holds about 1,100, and can take up to about 1,900.
“These detainees were jumping up and down trying to get our attention,” she said. What they told her was disturbing, and casually cruel. No ability to change clothes for 10 days. Filthy showers. No access to telephones because they need a PIN number and no matter how many times they request one, it never seems to materialize. No idea how long they would be held, or what would happen next.
“It could be weeks,” she said. “It could be years.”
Vanished.
“It is horrendous,” she said. “And it is ripping our communities apart,”
Indeed it is, especially in Southern California, where immigrants — documented and not — are entwined in the fabric of our lives and our communities.
Which is why people like Chu are so vital to what happens next. Not enough of our lawmakers have spoken up, much less taken action, against the erosion of civil rights and legal norms currently underway. Chu has spent a decade trying to bring accountability to immigration detention and knows this sordid industry better than any. It’s work that many never notice but that matters to the families whose loved ones are scooped up and disappeared into a system that, even in its best days, is convoluted.
“These are not the criminals and rapists that Trump promised he would get rid of,” Chu said. “These are hard-working people who are trying to make a living and doing their best to support their families. These are your friends and neighbors, and as we’ve seen, U.S. citizens have also been arrested. So next it could be you.”
Or her. Other lawmakers have been arrested and charged for attempting to enter detention centers on the East Coast, and Sen. Alex Padilla was knocked over and handcuffed recently for interrupting a news conference by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.
We are in the era when questions are often met with mockery or silence — or even violence — from authorities, and everyday champions are vital. Propaganda and lies have become the norms, and few have the ability to bear witness to truth inside places of state power such as detention centers.
So it’s also an era when having people who will stand up in the face of increasing fear and chaos is the difference between being vanished for who-knows-how-long and being found.
ADELANTO, Calif. — As federal immigration agents conduct mass raids across Southern California, the Adelanto ICE Processing Center is filling so rapidly it is reigniting longtime concerns about safety conditions inside the facility.
In less than two months, the number of detainees in the sprawling complex about 85 miles northeast of Los Angeles has surged from around 300 near the end of April to more than 1,200 as of Wednesday, according to the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California.
The largest detention center in California, Adelanto has for years been the focus of complaints from detainees, attorneys and state and federal inspectors about inadequate medical care, overly restrictive segregation and lax mental health services.
But now, critics — including some staff who work inside — warn that conditions inside have become increasingly unsafe and unsanitary. The facility, they say, is woefully unprepared to handle a massive increase in the number of detainees.
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“It’s dangerous,” a longtime Adelanto detention center staff member told The Times, speaking on condition of anonymity because they did not want to lose their job. “We have no staffing for this and not enough experienced staff. They’re just cutting way too many corners, and it affects the safety of everybody in there.”
On Tuesday, U.S. Rep Judy Chu (D-Monterey Park), toured Adelanto with four other Democratic members of Congress from California amid growing concern over the rapidly increasing number of detainees and deteriorating conditions inside the facility.
The facility’s manager “has to clearly improve its treatment of these detainees,” Chu said at a news conference after inspecting the facility for nearly two hours.
Some detainees told lawmakers they were held inside Adelanto for 10 days without a change of clothes, underwear or towels, Chu said. Others said they had been denied access to a telephone to speak to loved ones and lawyers, even after repeatedly filling out forms.
“I was just really shocked to hear that they couldn’t get a change of underwear, they couldn’t get socks for 10 days,” Chu told The Times. “They can’t get the PIN number for a telephone call. What about their legal rights? What about the ability to be in contact with their families? That is inhumane.”
Immigration Customs and Enforcement and GEO Group, the Florida-based private prison corporation that manages the Adelanto detention center, did not answer The Times’ questions about staffing or conditions inside the facility. The Times also sent questions to Homeland Security assistant secretary for public affairs Tricia McLaughlin, but they were not answered.
Lucero Garcia, third from left, gave an emotional account about her uncle who was taken from his work at an Orange County car wash. She and others were outside the Adelanto ICE Processing Center on Tuesday.
(Myung J. Chun/Los Angeles Times)
Over the last two weeks, new detainees have been forced to sleep on the floors of common areas without blankets and pillows and have spent days in the facility before they were provided with clean clothes and underwear, according to interviews with current detention center staff, immigration attorneys, and members of Congress who toured the facility. Some detainees have complained about lack of access to medication, lack of access to drinking water for four hours, and being served dinner as late as 10 p.m.
One detainee was not allowed his high blood pressure pills when family tried to bring it in, said Jennifer Norris, a staff attorney at Immigrant Defenders Law Center. In some cases, she said, lax medical care has led to emergencies: a Vietnamese man passed out last week because staff didn’t provide him with his necessary medication.
“It’s clear that with the ramp up enforcement, Adelanto just does not have the staff to keep pace with the aggressive enforcement that’s happening now,” Norris said. “It is bizarre. We spend millions of dollars on ICE detention and they’re not even able to provide basic necessities for the new arrivals.”
Long before Trump administration officials announced in May they were setting a new national goal of arresting 3,000 unauthorized immigrants a day, Adelanto workers worried about understaffing and unsafe conditions as the center processed new detainees.
At the end of last year, the facility held only three people. As of Wednesday, the number had swelled to 1,218, according to the ACLU of Southern California.
The climb is only partly due to the ICE agents’ recent escalation of immigrant raids.
The 1,940-bed Adelanto facility has been operating at a dramatically reduced capacity since 2020 when civil rights groups filed a class-action lawsuit demanding a drastic reduction in the number of people detained at Adelanto on the basis that they faced severe risk of contracting COVID-19. A federal judge forced the detention center to release detainees and prohibit new intakes and transfers.
But a series of federal court orders this year — the most recent in early June — has allowed the facility to fully reopen just as federal immigration agents fan out into neighborhoods and workplaces.
“As soon as the judge lifted the order, they just started slamming people in there,” an Adelanto staffer told The Times.
Eva Bitrán, director of immigrant rights at the ACLU of Southern California, said “almost everybody” held in the Adelanto facility had no criminal record before they arrived in the detention center.
“But even if they had a criminal record, even if they had served their time in criminal custody and then been brought to the ICE facility, nobody deserves 10 days in the same underwear,” Bitrán said. “Nobody deserves dirty showers, nobody deserves moldy food.”
The Adelanto ICE Processing Center.
(Myung J. Chun/Los Angeles Times)
Mario Romero, an Indigenous worker from Mexico who was detained June 6 at the Ambiance Apparel warehouse in downtown L.A., was one of dozens who ended up in Adelanto.
His daughter, Yurien Contreras, said she and her family were traumatized after her father was “chained by the hands, feet and waist,” taken to the Metropolitan Detention Center downtown and then “held hostage” in a van from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. with no access to water, food or a restroom.
“Little did we know,” she said, “it was only the beginning of the inhumane treatment our families would endure.”
At Adelanto, she said, officials try to force her father to sign documents without due process or legal representation. The medical care was “less than minimal,” she said, the food was unsustainable and the water tasted like Clorox.
Yurien Contreras’ father was taken by ICE agents from his workplace at Ambiance Apparel in Los Angeles.
(Myung J. Chun/Los Angeles Times)
Lucero Garcia told The Times she was concerned about her 61-year-old uncle, Candido, who was detained June 9 as he worked at his job at Magnolia Car Wash in Fountain Valley.
But when she visited him Saturday, “he didn’t want to share much,” she said. “He’s worried more about us.”
This is not the first time the Adelanto detention center has faced scrutiny.
In 2018, federal inspectors issued a report finding “serious violations” at the facility, including overly restrictive detainee segregation and guards failing to stop detainees from hanging braided bed sheet “nooses.”
But two staffers who spoke to The Times said they had never experienced such unsafe conditions at Adelanto.
As the prison population has increased over the last few months, they said, staff are working long hours without breaks, some even falling asleep driving home after their shifts and having car accidents. Shift duty officers with no security experience were being asked to make decisions in the middle of the night about whether to put detainees who felt threatened in protective custody. Officers, including people from food service, were being sent to the hospital to check on detainees with tuberculosis and hepatitis.
“Everyone’s just overwhelmed,” a staffer said.
Officers working over their allotted schedules were often tired when they were on duty, another staffer said.
In May, a detainee went into anaphylactic shock and ended up intubated in the hospital, the staffer said, because an officer wasn’t paying attention or was new and gave the detainee, who’s allergic to seafood, a tray that contained tuna.
At a May meeting, the warden told all executive staff that they needed to come to work dressed down on Tuesdays and Thursdays, the staffer said, because they would have to start doing janitorial work.
On June 2, a detainee at the Annex facility made his way from a medical holding area, through four locked doors, all the way back to his dorm unescorted, the staffer said — a major security breach.
“If he would’ve wanted to escape he would’ve been gone,” the staffer said. “All he did is push the buttons to access the doors and they were open for him, no questions. Apparently, whoever was in central control was too tired to check or too inexperienced.”
The detention center was becoming unsanitary, the staffer said, with trash bins not promptly emptied, bathrooms not cleaned and floors not mopped as they should be.
As new waves of detainees flooded into the facility over the last two weeks, the staffer said, the facility was chaotic and lacking basic supplies.
“We didn’t have enough to provide right away,” they said, “so we’re scrambling to get clothes and mattresses.”
Mark Ferretiz, who worked as a cook supervisor at Adelanto for 14 years until April, said former colleagues told him officers were working 16- to 20-hour shifts multiple days in a row without breaks, officers were slow to respond to physical fights between detainees, and food was limited for detainees.
“They had five years to prepare,” Ferretiz, who had served as a union steward, said of his former supervisors. “I don’t know the reason why they weren’t prepared.”
While the supply shortages appeared to ease some in recent days — a shipment of clothes and mattresses had arrived by Tuesday, when members of Congress toured — the detention center was still understaffed, the current staffer said.
Detainees were being served food on paper clam-shell to-go boxes, rather than regular trays, a staffer said, because the facility lacked employees to wash up at the end of mealtimes.
“Trash pickup’s not coming fast enough, ” a staffer said, noting that piles of trash sat outside, bagged up, beside the dumpsters.
In a statement last week, GEO Group Executive Chairman George C. Zoley said fully opening the Adelanto facility would allow his company to generate about $31 million in additional annualized revenues.
“We are proud of our approximately 350 employees at the Adelanto Center, whose dedication and professionalism have allowed GEO to establish a long-standing record of providing high-quality support services on behalf of ICE in the state of California,” Zoley said.
But after touring the facility, members of Congress said officials did not provide answers to basic questions.
When Chu asked officials about whether California immigrants were being taken to other states, she said, they said, “We don’t know.”
WASHINGTON — The day after immigration raids began in Los Angeles, Rep. Norma Torres (D-Pomona) and three other members of Congress were denied entry to the immigrant detention facility inside the Roybal Federal Building.
The lawmakers were attempting an unannounced inspection, a common and long-standing practice under congressional oversight powers.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials said too many protesters were present on June 7 and officers deployed chemical agents multiple times. In a letter later to acting ICE Director Todd Lyons, Torres said she ended up in the emergency room for respiratory treatment. She also said the protest had been small and peaceful.
Torres is one of many Democratic members of Congress, from states including California, New York and Illinois, who have been denied entry to immigrant detention facilities in recent weeks.
Jim Townsend, director of the Carl Levin Center for Oversight and Democracy at Wayne State University in Michigan, said the denials mark a profound — and illegal — shift from past practice.
“Denying members of Congress access to facilities is a direct assault on our system of checks and balances,” he said. “What members of Congress are trying to do now is to be part of a proud bipartisan tradition of what we like to call oversight by showing up.”
Subsequent attempts by lawmakers to inspect the facility inside the Roybal Building have also been unsuccessful.
Rep. Jimmy Gomez (D-Los Angeles), who was with Torres the day she was hospitalized, went back twice more — on June 9 and on Tuesday — and was rebuffed. Torres and Rep. Judy Chu (D-Monterey Park) tried at separate times Wednesday and were both denied.
Gomez and other Democrats have pointed to a federal statute, detailed in yearly appropriations packages since 2020, which states that funds may not be used to prevent a member of Congress “from entering, for the purpose of conducting oversight, any facility operated by or for the Department of Homeland Security used to detain or otherwise house aliens …”
The statute also states that nothing in that section “may be construed to require a Member of Congress to provide prior notice of the intent to enter a facility” for the purpose of conducting oversight. Under the statute, federal officials may require at least 24 hours notice for a visit by congressional staff — but not members themselves.
Under ICE guidelines published this month for members of Congress and their staff, the agency requests at least 72 hours notice from lawmakers and requires at least 24 hours notice from staff.
The agency says it has discretion to deny or reschedule a visit if an emergency arises or the safety of the facility is jeopardized, though such contingencies are not mentioned in the law.
Gomez said an ICE official called him Tuesday to say that oversight law doesn’t apply to the downtown L.A. facility because it is a field office, not a detention facility.
“Well it does say Metropolitan Detention Center right here in big, bold letters,” he says in a video posted afterward on social media, gesturing toward a sign outside the building. “But they say this is a processing center. So I smell bull—.”
Department of Homeland Security police patrol the street after detaining a protester at the Edward R. Roybal Federal Building in downtown L.A. on June 12.
(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
If no one is technically being detained, Gomez said he rhetorically asked the official during their call, are they free to leave?
Torres visited the facility in February by setting up an appointment, her staff said. She got another appointment for last Saturday, but ICE canceled it because of the protests. When members emailed ICE to set up a new appointment, they got no response.
Gomez said he believes ICE doesn’t want lawmakers to see field offices because of poor conditions and lack of attorney access because of ramped-up arrests that have reportedly left some detainees there overnight without beds and limited food.
In some cases, lawmakers have had success showing up unannounced. On Friday, Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-Redlands) toured the Adelanto ICE Processing Facility, north of San Bernardino. After being denied entry to the Adelanto Facility on June 8, Chu and four other California Democrats were allowed in on Tuesday.
“Just because ICE has opened their doors to a few members of Congress does not excuse their inflammatory tactics to meet deportation quotas,” said Rep. Mark Takano (D-Riverside), who visited Adelanto with Chu. “Accountability means showing a consistent pattern of accessibility, not just a one-off event.”
The representatives learned the facility is now at full capacity with 1,100 detainees, up from 300 a month ago. Chu said they spoke to detainees from the L.A. raids, who she said were not criminals and who are now living in inhumane conditions — without enough food, unable to change their underwear for 10 days or to call their families and lawyers.
Chu said the group arrived early and stood in the lobby to avoid a repeat of their previous attempt, when facility guards kept them off the property by locking a fence.
Tom Homan, President Trump’s border policy advisor, departs a meeting with Republican senators who are working to cancel $9.4 billion in spending already approved by Congress at the Capitol in Washington on June 11.
(J. Scott Applewhite / Associated Press)
In an interview with The Times this month, Trump’s chief border policy advisor Tom Homan said members of Congress are welcome to conduct oversight, but that they must contact the facility first to make arrangements. The agency has to look after the safety and security of the facility, officers and detainees, he said.
“Please go in and look at them,” he said. “They’re the best facilities that money can buy, the highest detention standards in the industry. But there’s a right way and wrong way to do it.”
Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary for Homeland Security, said in a statement to The Times that requests for visits are needed because “ICE law enforcement have seen a surge in assaults, disruptions and obstructions to enforcement, including by politicians themselves.”
She added that requests for visits should be made with enough time — “a week is sufficient” — to not interfere with the president’s authority under Article II of the Constitution to oversee executive branch functions.
DHS Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin, flanked by Deputy Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Madison Sheahan, left, and acting Director of ICE Todd Lyons, speaks during a news conference in Washington on May 21.
“This unlawful policy is a smokescreen to deny Member visits to ICE offices across the country, which are holding migrants — and sometimes even U.S. citizens — for days at a time,” he wrote. “They are therefore facilities and are subject to oversight and inspection at any time. DHS pretending otherwise is simply their latest lie.”
Townsend, the congressional oversight expert, said the practice goes back to when President Truman was a senator and established a committee to investigate problems among contractors who were supplying the World War II effort.
“That committee conducted hundreds of field visits, and they would show up unannounced in many instances,” Townsend said.
More recently, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) drove to the Pentagon in 1983 and demanded access to ask questions about overspending after being stonewalled, he said, by Department of Defense officials.
The Supreme Court has interpreted the Constitution to mean that Congress has wide authority to conduct oversight to show up unannounced in order to secure accurate information, Townsend said.
National Guard members stand at post at the Edward R. Roybal Federal Building in Los Angeles on June 10.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) said the Trump administration is trying to hide the truth from the public. Last week, Padilla was shoved out of a news conference, forced to the ground and handcuffed after attempting to question Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.
“The Trump administration has done everything in their power but to provide transparency to the American people about their mission in Los Angeles,” he said during an impassioned floor speech Wednesday in which he cried recounting the ordeal.
In an interview Wednesday with Newsmax, McLaughlin accused Democratic lawmakers of using oversight as an excuse to stage publicity stunts.
“The Democrats are reeling,” she said. “They have no actual message and so they’re doing this to get more attention and to manufacture viral moments.”
On Tuesday, Gomez wore a suit jacket with his congressional lapel pin and carried his congressional ID card and business card in his hand — “so there would be no mistake” as to who he was. He said he was concerned that what happened to Padilla could also happen to him. He was denied access anyway.
Gomez said federal officials should be fined each time they deny oversight access to members of Congress. He said he and other members are also discussing whether to file a lawsuit to compel access.
“When you have an administration that is operating outside the bounds of the law, they’re basically saying, ‘What recourse do you have? Can you force us? You don’t have an army. We don’t need to listen to you,’” Gomez said. “Then you have to put some real teeth into it.”
Times staff writer Nathan Solis in Los Angeles contributed to this report.
One of the two detainees still missing after escaping from a New Jersey federal immigration detention center has been arrested, the FBI said Tuesday.
Franklin Norberto Bautista-Reyes, from Honduras, has been taken into custody, FBI spokesperson Amy Thoreson said in an email. Andres Felipe Pineda-Mogollon, from Colombia, is still missing from Thursday night’s escape, the bureau said.
Bautista-Reyes and Pineda-Mogollon and two other men busted out of the Delaney Hall detention center in Newark during reports of disorder there by breaking through a wall and escaping from a parking lot, according to U.S. Sen. Andy Kim, a New Jersey Democrat, and Homeland Security officials.
All four men were in the country illegally and had been charged by local police in New Jersey and New York City, federal officials said.
Bautista-Reyes was charged in May with aggravated assault, attempt to cause bodily injury, terroristic threats and a weapon crime. Pineda-Mogollon, from Colombia, was charged with minor larceny and burglary crimes.
The details surrounding Bautista-Reyes’ capture were not immediately clear. Messages seeking information were sent to the FBI and the Homeland Security Department, which oversees Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
The FBI on Monday had increased the reward for information leading to their arrest to $25,000 from $10,000.
Joel Enrique Sandoval-Lopez, one of the other fugitives, was taken into custody in Passaic, N.J., on Friday, the day after the escape in nearby Newark. Then, on Sunday, Joan Sebastian Castaneda-Lozada surrendered to federal authorities in Milleville, N.J. Sandoval-Lopez, from Honduras, was charged with unlawful possession of a handgun in October and aggravated assault in February, officials said. Castaneda-Lozada, from Colombia, was charged with burglary, theft and conspiracy, authorities said.
A message seeking comment on behalf of the men was left Tuesday with the New Jersey public defender’s office. It’s unclear who may be representing the men.
Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, a Democrat who’s been critical of President Trump’s immigration crackdown, cited reports of a possible uprising and escape after disorder broke out at the facility Thursday night and protesters outside the center locked arms and pushed against barricades as vehicles passed through gates. Much is still unclear about what unfolded there.
But GEO Group, the company that owns and operates the detention facility for the federal government, said in a statement that there was “no widespread unrest” at the facility.
Delaney Hall has been the site of clashes this year between Democratic officials who say the facility needs more oversight and the Trump administration and those who run the facility.
Baraka was arrested May 9, handcuffed and charged with trespassing. The charge was later dropped and U.S. Democratic Rep. LaMonica McIver was later charged with assaulting federal officers, stemming from a skirmish that happened outside the facility. She has denied the charges.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Israel pounded Iran for a fifth day in an air campaign against its longstanding foe’s military and nuclear program, as U.S. President Trump warned residents of Tehran to evacuate and suggested the United States was working on something “better than a ceasefire.”
Trump left the Group of Seven summit in Canada a day early to deal with the conflict between Israel and Iran, telling reporters on Air Force One during the flight back to Washington: “I’m not looking at a ceasefire. We’re looking at better than a ceasefire.”
When asked to explain, he said the U.S. wanted to see “a real end” to the conflict that could involve Iran “giving up entirely.” He added: “I’m not too much in the mood to negotiate.”
Trump’s cryptic messages added to the uncertainty roiling the region as residents of Tehran fled their homes in droves and the U.N. nuclear watchdog for the first time said Israeli strikes on Iran’s main enrichment facility at Natanz had also damaged its underground section, and not just the suface area.
Israel says its sweeping assault on Iran’s top military leaders, nuclear scientists, uranium enrichment sites and ballistic missile program is necessary to prevent its adversary from getting any closer to building an atomic weapon. The strikes have killed at least 224 people in Iran.
Iran has retaliated by launching more than 370 missiles and hundreds of drones at Israel. So far, 24 people have been killed in Israel. The Israeli military said a new barrage of missiles was launched on Tuesday.
Damage at Natanz
The International Atomic Energy Agency said on Tuesday it believes that Israel’s first aerial attacks on Iran’s Natanz enrichment site had “direct impacts” on the facility’s underground centrifuge halls.
“Based on continued analysis of high-resolution satellite imagery collected after Friday’s attacks, the IAEA has identified additional elements that indicate direct impacts on the underground enrichment halls at Natanz,” the watchdog said.
Located 135 miles southeast of Tehran, the Natanz facility was protected by anti-aircraft batteries, fencing and Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard.
The underground part of the facility is buried to protect it from airstrikes and contains the bulk of the enrichment facilities at Natanz, with 10,000 centrifuges that enrich uranium up to 5%, experts assess.
The IAEA had earlier reported that Israeli strikes had destroyed an above-ground enrichment hall at Natanz and knocked out electrical equipment that powered the facility.
However, most of Iran’s enrichment takes place underground.
Although Israel has struck Natanz repeatedly and claims to have inflicted significant damage on its underground facilities, Tuesday’s IAEA statement marked the first time the agency has acknowledged impacts there.
Iran maintains its nuclear program is peaceful, and the United States and others have assessed Tehran has not had an organized effort to pursue a nuclear weapon since 2003. But the head of the IAEA has repeatedly warned that the country has enough enriched uranium to make several nuclear bombs should it choose to do so.
While Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed on Tuesday that Israeli strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites have set the country’s nuclear program back a “very, very long time,” Israel has not been able to reach Iran’s Fordo uranium enrichment facility, which is buried deep underground.
Shops closed, lines for gas in Iran’s capital
Echoing an earlier Israeli military call for some 330,000 residents of a neighborhood in downtown Tehran to evacuate, Trump on Tuesday warned on social media that “everyone should immediately evacuate Tehran!”
Tehran is one of the largest cities in the Middle East, with around 10 million people, roughly equivalent to the entire population of Israel. People have been fleeing since hostilities began.
Asked why he had urged for the evacuation of Tehran, Trump said: “I just want people to be safe.”
Downtown Tehran appeared to be emptying out early Tuesday, with many shops closed. The ancient Grand Bazaar was also closed, something that only happened in the past during anti-government demonstrations or at the height of the coronavirus pandemic.
On the roads out of Tehran to the west, traffic stood bumper to bumper. Many appeared to be heading to the Caspian Sea, a popular vacation spot where a large number of middle- and upper-class Iranians have second homes.
Long lines also could be seen at gas stations in Tehran. Printed placards and billboards calling for a “severe” response to Israel were visible across the city. Authorities cancelled leave for doctors and nurses, while insisting everything was under control.
The Israeli military meanwhile claimed to have killed someone it described as Iran’s top general in a strike on Tehran. Iran did not immediately comment on the reported killing of Gen. Ali Shadmani, who had just been named as the head of the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, part of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard.
Iran has named other generals to replace the top leaders of the Guard and the regular armed forces after they were killed in earlier strikes.
Trump leaves G7 early to focus on conflict
Before leaving the summit in Canada, Trump joined the other leaders in a joint statement saying Iran “can never have a nuclear weapon” and calling for a “de-escalation of hostilities in the Middle East, including a ceasefire in Gaza.”
French President Emmanuel Macron told reporters that discussions were underway on a ceasefire between Israel and Iran, but Trump appeared to shoot that down in his comments on social media.
Macron “mistakenly said that I left the G7 Summit, in Canada, to go back to D.C. to work on a ‘cease fire’ between Israel and Iran,” Trump wrote. “Wrong! He has no idea why I am now on my way to Washington, but it certainly has nothing to do with a Cease Fire. Much bigger than that.”
Trump said he wasn’t ready to give up on diplomatic talks, and could send Vice President JD Vance and special envoy Steve Witkoff to meet with the Iranians.
“I may,” he said. “It depends on what happens when I get back.”
Israel says it has ‘aerial superiority’ over Tehran
Israeli military spokesperson Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin said Monday his country’s forces had “achieved full aerial superiority over Tehran’s skies.”
The military said it destroyed more than 120 surface-to-surface missile launchers in central Iran, a third of Iran’s total, including multiple launchers just before they launched ballistic missiles towards Israel. It also destroyed two F-14 fighter planes that Iran used to target Israeli aircraft, the military said.
Israeli military officials also said fighter jets had struck 10 command centers in Tehran belonging to Iran’s Quds Force, an elite arm of its paramilitary Revolutionary Guard that conducts military and intelligence operations outside Iran.
Israel’s military issued an evacuation warning for a part of central Tehran that houses state TV and police headquarters, as well as three large hospitals, including one owned by the Guard. It has issued similar evacuation warnings for parts of the Gaza Strip and Lebanon ahead of strikes.
Krauss, Gambrell and Melzer write for the Associated Press. Melzer reported from Nahariya, Israel. AP writers Nasser Karimi and Amir Vahdat in Tehran; Melanie Lidman in Tel Aviv; and Tara Copp in Washington contributed to this report.
LEAVENWORTH, Kan. — Leavenworth, Kan., occupies a mythic space in American crime, its name alone evoking a shorthand for serving hard time. The federal penitentiary housed gangsters Al Capone and Machine Gun Kelly — in a building so storied that it inspired the term “the big house.”
Now Kansas’ oldest city could soon be detaining far less famous people, migrants swept up in President Trump’s promise of mass deportations of those living in the U.S. illegally.
The federal government has signed a deal with the private prison firm CoreCivic Corp. to reopen a 1,033-bed prison in Leavenworth as part of a surge of contracts U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has issued without seeking competitive bids.
ICE has cited a “compelling urgency” for thousands more detention beds, and its efforts have sent profit estimates soaring for politically connected private companies, including CoreCivic, based in the Nashville area and another giant firm, the Geo Group Inc., headquartered in southern Florida.
That push faces resistance. Leavenworth filed a lawsuit against CoreCivic after it tried to reopen without city officials signing off on the deal, quoting a federal judge’s past description of the now-shuttered prison as a “hell hole.” The case in Leavenworth serves as another test of the limits of the Republican president’s unusually aggressive tactics to force migrant removals.
To get more detention beds, the Trump administration has modified dozens of existing agreements with contractors and used no-bid contracts. One pays $73 million to a company led by former federal immigration officials for “immigration enforcement support teams” to handle administrative tasks, such as helping coordinate removals, triaging complaints or telling ICE if someone is a risk to community safety.
Just last week, Geo Group announced that ICE modified a contract for an existing detention center in southeastern Georgia so that the company could reopen an idle prison on adjacent land to hold 1,868 migrants — and earn $66 million in annual revenue.
“Never in our 42-year company history have we had so much activity and demand for our services as we are seeing right now,” said CoreCivic CEO Damon Hininger during an earnings call last month with shareholders.
A tax-cutting and budget reconciliation measure approved last month by the House includes $45 billion over four years for immigrant detention, a threefold spending increase. The Senate is now considering that legislation.
Declaring an emergency to expedite contracts
When Trump started his second term in January, CoreCivic and Geo had around 20 idle facilities, partly because of sentencing reforms that reduced prison populations. But the Trump administration wants to more than double the existing 41,000 beds for detaining migrants to at least 100,000 beds and — if private prison executives’ predictions are accurate — possibly to more than 150,000.
ICE declared a national emergency on the U.S. border with Mexico as part of its justification for authorizing nine five-year contracts for a combined 10,312 beds without “Full and Open Competition.”
Only three of the nine potential facilities were listed in ICE’s document: Leavenworth, a 2,560-bed CoreCivic-owned facility in California City and an 1,800-bed Geo-owned prison in Baldwin, Mich.
The agreement for the Leavenworth facility hasn’t been released, nor have documents for the other two sites. CoreCivic and Geo Group officials said last month on earnings calls that ICE used what are known as letter contracts, meant to speed things up when time is critical.
Charles Tiefer, a contract expert and professor emeritus of law at the University of Baltimore Law School, said letter contracts normally are reserved for minor matters, not the big changes he sees ICE making to previous agreements.
“I think that a letter contract is a pathetic way to make big important contracts,” he said.
A Kansas prison town becomes a priority
CoreCivic’s Leavenworth facility quickly became a priority for ICE and the company because of its central location. Leavenworth, with 37,000 residents, is only 10 miles to the west of the Kansas City International Airport. The facility would hold men and women and is within ICE’s area of operations for Chicago, 420 miles to the northeast.
“That would mean that people targeted in the Chicago area and in Illinois would end up going to this facility down in Kansas,” said Jesse Franzblau, a senior policy analyst for the National Immigrant Justice Center.
Prisons have long been an important part of Leavenworth’s economy, employing hundreds of workers to guard prisoners held in two military facilities, the nation’s first federal penitentiary, a Kansas correctional facility and a county jail within six miles of city hall.
Resistance from Trump country
The Leavenworth area’s politics might have been expected to help CoreCivic. Trump carried its county by more than 20 percentage points in each of his three campaigns for president.
But skeptical city officials argue that CoreCivic needs a special use permit to reopen its facility. CoreCivic disagrees, saying that it doesn’t because it never abandoned the facility and that the permitting process would take too long. Leavenworth sued the company to force it to get one, and a state-court judge issued an order requiring it earlier this month.
An attorney for the city, Joe Hatley, said the legal fight indicates how much ill will CoreCivic generated when it held criminal suspects there for trials in federal court for the U.S. Marshals Service.
In late 2021, CoreCivic stopped housing pretrial detainees in its Leavenworth facility after then-President Biden, a Democrat, called on the U.S. Department of Justice to curb the use of private prisons. In the months before the closure, the American Civil Liberties Union and federal public defenders detailed stabbings, suicides, a homicide and inmate rights violations in a letter to the White House. CoreCivic responded at the time that the claims were “false and defamatory.”
Vacancies among correctional officers were as high as 23%, according to a Department of Justice report from 2017.
“It was just mayhem,” recalled William Rogers, who worked as a guard at the CoreCivic facility in Leavenworth from 2016-20. He said repeated assaults sent him to the emergency room three times, including once after a blow to the head that required 14 staples.
The critics have included a federal judge
When Leavenworth sued CoreCivic, it opened its lawsuit with a quote from U.S. District Court Judge Julie Robinson — an appointee of President George W. Bush, a Republican — who said of the prison: “The only way I could describe it frankly, what’s going on at CoreCivic right now is it’s an absolute hell hole.”
The city’s lawsuit described detainees locked in showers as punishment. It said that sheets and towels from the facility clogged up the wastewater system and that CoreCivic impeded the city police force’s ability to investigate sexual assaults and other violent crimes.
The facility had no inmates when CoreCivic gave reporters a tour earlier this year, and it looked scrubbed top to bottom and the smell of disinfectant hung in the air. One unit for inmates had a painting on one wall featuring a covered wagon.
During the tour, when asked about the allegations of past problems, Misty Mackey, a longtime CoreCivic employee who was tapped to serve as warden there, apologized for past employees’ experiences and said the company officials “do our best to make sure that we learn from different situations.”
ICE moves quickly across the U.S.
Besides CoreCivic’s Leavenworth prison, other once-shuttered facilities could come online near major immigrant population centers, from New York to Los Angeles, to help Trump fulfill his deportation plans.
ICE wants to reopen existing facilities because it’s faster than building new ones, said Marcela Hernandez, the organizing director for the Detention Watch Network, which has organized nationwide protests against ICE detention.
Counties often lease out jail space for immigrant detention, but ICE said some jurisdictions have passed ordinances barring that.
ICE has used contract modifications to reopen shuttered lockups like the 1,000-bed Delaney Hall Facility in Newark, N.J., and a 2,500-bed facility in Dilley, Texas, offering no explanations why new, competitively bid contracts weren’t sought.
The Newark facility, with its own history of problems, resumed intakes May 1, and disorder broke out at the facility Thursday night. Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, a Democrat who previously was arrested there and accused of trespassing, cited reports of a possible uprising, and the Department of Homeland Security confirmed four escapes.
The contract modification for Dilley, which was built to hold families and resumed operations in March, calls its units “neighborhoods” and gives them names like Brown Bear and Blue Butterfly.
The financial details for the Newark and Dilley contract modifications are blacked out in online copies, as they for more than 50 other agreements ICE has signed since Trump took office. ICE didn’t respond to a request for comment.
From idle prisons to a ‘gold rush’
Private prison executives are forecasting hundreds of millions of dollars in new ICE profits. Since Trump’s reelection in November, CoreCivic’s stock has risen in price by 56% and Geo’s by 73%.
“It’s the gold rush,” Michael A. Hallett, a professor of criminal justice at the University of North Florida who studies private prisons. “All of a sudden, demand is spiraling. And when you’re the only provider that can meet demand, you can pretty much set your terms.”
Geo’s former lobbyist Pam Bondi is now the U.S. attorney general. It anticipates that all of its idle prisons will be activated this year, its executive chairman, George Zoley, told shareholders.
CoreCivic, which along with Geo donated millions of dollars to largely GOP candidates at all levels of government and national political groups, is equally optimistic. It began daily talks with the Trump administration immediately after the election in November, said Hininger.
CoreCivic officials said ICE’s letter contracts provide initial funding to begin reopening facilities while the company negotiates a longer-term deal. The Leavenworth deal is worth $4.2 million a month to the company, it disclosed in a court filing.
Tiefer, who served on an independent commission established to study government contracting for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, said ICE is “placing a very dicey long-term bet” because of its past problems and said ICE is giving CoreCivic “the keys to the treasury” without competition.
But financial analysts on company earnings calls have been delighted. When CoreCivic announced its letter contracts, Joe Gomes, of the financial services firm Noble Capital Markets, responded with, “Great news.”
“Are you hiding any more of them on us?” he asked.
Hollingsworth and Hanna write for the Associated Press. Hanna reported from Topeka, Kan. AP writers Joshua Goodman in Miami and Morgan Lee, in Santa Fe, N.M., contributed to this report.
