Locals push back on ICE detention centers
Residents express pressure on private landowners
By: Christopher Cann
USA Today
..... A Trump administration plan to rapidly expand immigration detention sites has hit a snag: Many locals don't like the idea of warehouses in the communities becoming deportation detention centers.
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Since December, [2025] Immigration and Customs Enforcement has purchased toured or attempted to buy at least a dozen commercial buildings in states including, Texas, Mississippi, New York and Oregon, USA Today has found. Court records and other disclosures show sale prices of up to $100 million per warehouse.
..... But in some cases, public outrage has led deals to collapse as politicians form both parties side with residents.
..... Some of those politicians support the administration's immigration enforcement efforts, such as Senator Roger Wicker, R-Mississippi, who on February 4 [2026] urged ICE not to convert a warehouse in the town of Byhalia into a facility that would hold more than 8.500 detainees. That would put "significant strain" on local resources, eh wrote in a letter to Homeland Security Sectary Kristi Noem. The largest current ICE detention center, Camp East Montana at Fort Bliss Army base in Texas, has 5,000 beds.
..... Advocates and elected officials have also raised concerns that the buildings were intended to house cargo - not people - and cited reports of poor conditions at newly constructed facilities.
..... Camp East Montana, a tent camp, was cited for 60 violations by ICE inspectors in September, [2025] and a report from the American Civil Liberties Union found patterns of physical and sexual abuse, medical neglect and insufficient food. The death of a Cuban migrant there was ruled a homicide. The Departed of Homeland Security denied the allegations of abuse in the report and maintained that all detainees are given proper due process.
..... ICE did not respond to specific questions but defended the administration's effort to ramp up its detention capacity.
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"There will not be warehouses - they will be very well-structured detention facilities meeting our regular detention standards," an ICE spokesperson said in an email.
..... There were 107 detention centers in January 2025. by the end of the year, [2025] that number has roughly doubled to 212, according to ICE data. These sites include privately run, dedicated immigration detention centers; temporary tent facilities on military bases; county jails; and state prisons.
..... The shift to re-purposing large commercial spaces highlights the Trump administration;s aggressive push to maximize deportations, said Nayna Gupta, policy director at the American Immigration council.
..... "Building a new facility with hard walls takes a lot of time," shes aid. "Purchasing existing facilities that are easier to stand up is a way to overcome delays and barriers."
..... The efforts, Gupta said, seem to along with comments ICE Acting Director Todd Lyons made in 2025 at a border security expo in Arizona.
..... "We need to get better at treating this like a business," Lyons said their, adding that he wanted those deportation run "like [Amazon] Prime, but with human beings."
..... As word of these prosed facilities spread, so has furor.
..... In Chester, New York, a town Trump won in 2024, hundreds of people braved freezing temperatures to protest a proposed warehouse conversion plan. A village board meeting had to be moved to a bigger location because e 600 people showed up to decry the proposed facility.
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In Washington County, Maryland, where Trump won 60% of the vote in 2024, residents on JAnaur 20 [2026] protested after DHS brought a warehouse for more than $102 million. Nancy Even's, 80, said the agency is "arresting people they shouldn't be: and "using way too much force."
..... Similar protests have been held in Orlando, Florida,; Salt Lake City; Surprise, Arizona; Social Circle, Georgia; and Salem, Oregon.
..... Local officials say they have limited power to stop the federal government from acquiring land and building, especially from private owners.
..... Officials in Surprise, where ICE bought a warehouse from a private company for $70 million in cash, said federal projects are not subject to local regulations such as zoning. this "leaves us completely helpless," said council-member Chris Judd.
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In Orlando, where ICE officials have repeatedly visited a 440,000-square-foot warehouse, Democratic Mayor Buddy Dyer said in a statement that the city tried to find a path to prevent an ICE detention facility from opening and found none.
..... Some sites and states are attempting to implement ordinances and regulations to block ICE detention centers from opening, though it remains unclear if efforts will be successful. Among them, New Mexico's Democratic-led legislature passed a bill February 3 [2026] banning ICE detention centers in the state; similar bills have been introduced in Delaware, New York, and Massachusetts.
..... However, protesters and officials have found one winning formula; pressuring private landowners.
..... In Salt Lake City, rumors about a potential ICE detention facility sparked a protest outside the warehouse that was reportedly being considered. on January 24, [2026] the Ritchie Group said in a statement that the company had "no plans to sell or lease the property in question to the federal government."
..... On January 30, [2026] Jim Pattinson Development made a similar announcement, assuring residents in Ashland, Virginia, that it would not move forward with a deal to sell a 550,000-square-foot warehouse to DHS. the company said it had accepted the bid before it was aware that the facility would be used "in support of ICE operations."
..... The owners of an Oklahoma City warehouse that was set to be purchased by ICE pulled out of a deal following outcry at city council meetings and protests downtown.
..... Contributing;: Lauren Villagran, Ignacio Calderan and Jennifer Borresen, USA Today; Steve Lackmeyer, Maria Guinnip and Jessie Christopher Smith, the Okahoman; Vandana Saras, Middletown Times Herald-Record; Julie E. Greene, The Herald-Mail; Elena Santa Cruz, Arizona Republic; Adam Powell and Jeff Abbott, El Pas Times; Pam Dankins, Mississippi Clarion ledger