U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) acting director Todd Lyons has stated his horrific goal of building a deportation system that treats people like packages; “Like (Amazon) Prime, but with human beings,” he said last year. To advance this dehumanizing vision, the Trump administration aims to acquire more than 20 warehouses to imprison people who are to be deported, often without due process and in violation of their legal rights.  

ICE’s plan is to use the converted warehouses to speed up the deportation process—or, as described in a draft solicitation reported on by the Washington Post, to “maximize efficiency, minimize costs.” Instead of relying on smaller facilities throughout the country, they will book immigrants into local processing sites, then transition them into these enormous new detention centers where they are likely to be far from their homes, families, and attorneys. The plan would add upward of 80,000 detention beds, with some of the warehouses holding nearly 10,000 people.

But coordinated efforts to prevent ICE from obtaining these warehouses show how opposition to President Trump’s immigration policy continues to grow. Though Trump seems to see himself as a king with limitless power, the federal government often requires the consent and participation of the public to function. Public and private entities are pushing back on the warehouse purchases, realizing that they don't have to facilitate the Trump administration’s cruel efforts to detain immigrants in warehouse settings. As public opinion turns against inhumane ICE enforcement—and nearly two thirds of people disapprove of the way that ICE is enforcing immigration laws—local successes offer lessons that can build momentum for coordinated resistance, with the ultimate goal of shrinking immigration detention. 

Public pressure campaigns on companies that own warehouses yield results

Following public backlash and criticism, some companies have rejected or canceled sales or leases of warehouses to ICE for use as immigration detention sites. Reports that an Ashland, Virginia, industrial property owned by Vancouver-based megacorporation Jim Pattison Developments was to be used as an ICE processing facility sparked calls for a boycott of the company as well as suspended media buys. “Our decision is grounded in a commitment to human rights, dignity and justice,” Point Blank Creative, a media agency, wrote in a letter announcing that it would halt media buys from Pattison Group entities. “We stand firmly against the targeting and terrorizing of immigrants by the Trump Administration and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and we strongly oppose Pattison Group’s decision to allow its commercial property in the U.S. to be used as ICE processing facilities.” In February, Jim Pattison Developments announced it had canceled the sale of the property to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Even as the detention boom has been so wildly profitable for some companies, economic pressure is clearly working on others.

Following reports that ICE was seeking to locate a 9,500-person detention facility in a warehouse owned by Majestic Realty Co. in Hutchins, Texas, residents mounted a campaign urging city leaders to oppose the use. Political figures—including state representatives, city council members, and the mayor—vocally opposed the plans, leading the California-based company to announce that it would not lease or sell its warehouse to DHS for use as a detention center. “My voice matters, your voice matters, all of us coming together against something that we know is wrong,” Kim Verriere, a member of the Clergy League for Emergency Action and Response, told Fox4 news. “The public pressure, I think, ultimately led to this happening.”

Local governments take action against ICE warehouse use

Residents aren’t the only ones pushing back. Local governments are also enforcing land use regulations to hinder the expansion of ICE detention facilities. Last year, Portland, Oregon, issued a land use violation to the owner of a building that ICE is leasing, saying that ICE had breached the terms of the original agreement for the property’s use by detaining people overnight, starting a wave of efforts to hinder ICE detention through zoning regulations. Platform Ventures, a Kansas City-based investment firm, announced in February that it was canceling the sale of one of its properties to DHS after the City Council of Kansas City, Missouri, passed a five-year moratorium on permits for non-municipal detention facilities in the city. “We consistently hear from residents that Kansas City’s focus should be on economic development and housing, not mass detention facilities holding thousands,” Mayor Quinton Lucas said after protests followed news of the proposed sale of the property. “Our priority is building businesses, homes, and schools that strengthen and grow our community.”  

Local government opposition also deterred a warehouse conversion in Salt Lake City. The Ritchie Group, which owns a property reportedly sought by ICE, stated that they “have no plans” to sell or lease the warehouse to the federal government to hold 7,500 people after Salt Lake County Mayor Jenny Wilson opposed the facility, saying she planned to pursue “all available legal and policy avenues, including land-use authority, regulatory review, and coordination with local partners” to stop the project. Suddenly, the mundane grinding gears of bureaucracy—so often widely reviled—are effective tools in the fight against ICE. “An opposition coalition is forming quickly, and it reflects widespread unease about ICE’s aggressive and unchecked conduct nationwide, and the instability detention facilities often bring to surrounding communities,” Wilson wrote. “A detention center of this magnitude would bring disruption, strain local resources, and harm the economic and social fabric of our community.”

Local opposition to the establishment of massive new immigration detention facilities is appearing in communities across the political spectrum. Republican legislators representing majority-Republican communities including Roxbury, New Jersey, and  Surprise, Arizona, are fighting possible detention centers because of the strain they put on local resources and infrastructure. And Democrat-controlled El Paso, Texas, unanimously approved a plan that directs the city manager and city attorney to find ways to prevent new ICE detention centers in the city. Both Democrats and Republicans have called for more local input into ICE’ s plans to situate detention centers in communities, reflecting widespread dissatisfaction with the agency’s opaque actions. 

Federal leaders oppose new ICE sites and ICE funding

Resistance is also emerging at the federal level, with even some of Trump’s own base opposing ICE detention in warehouses in their districts. Federal legislators have introduced a bill to prevent DHS from opening new immigration detention centers without state and local officials’ consent, and members of Congress from at least 10 states—including Republican legislators—have used letters, petitions, and appropriations amendments to oppose immigration detention facilities in warehouses. 

This includes some legislators who have previously lauded Trump’s extreme approach to immigration. Ironically, DHS decided not to site a facility in the jurisdiction of Republican U.S. Senator Roger Wicker after he sent a letter to DHS Secretary Kristi Noem opposing the location of a “mega center” for ICE detention in a 800-square foot warehouse in Byhalia, Mississippi. He said that while he supports immigration enforcement, the facility “forecloses economic growth opportunities and replaces them with a use that does not generate comparable economic returns or community benefits.”

Democrats pointed to Wicker’s success when asking DHS to cancel facilities in their jurisdictions. “I would hope that I would get the same treatment that Senator Wicker got, which is to say, the town doesn’t want the detention center, so please cancel it,” said Senator Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire.  

Following ICE’s deadliest year in decades, more people see that granting the Trump administration an unprecedented $45 billion to expand immigration detention was a grave mistake—including one Republican senator who voted for it. Efforts to confine thousands of people in warehouses that were designed for storing products is yet another reason that this funding should be sharply reduced. Promising efforts to rescind the $75 billion in reconciliation funding allocated to ICE include attempts in the DHS appropriations negotiations and H.R. 7346, the Drain ICE Act. The reconciliation bill delivered an unprecedented surge in funding for every facet of immigration enforcement—$191 billion above annual appropriations, including more than $75 billion for ICE alone. At the same time, the bill slashed nearly $1 trillion in Medicaid spending to offset these costs. The Drain ICE bill is a first step toward restoring programs that benefit public health and safety, including Medicaid.    

In the face of a lawless government and a detention apparatus supercharged by an unprecedented financial windfall, real resistance seems almost impossible. As public opinion turns against ICE enforcement, it is encouraging to watch grassroots organizations and local leaders find ways to slow the detention and deportation machine. Their successes yield worthy lessons during a dark era and build momentum for future resistance to the Trump administration’s dangerous immigration agenda.