DHS Pauses Plans to Expand Immigrant Detention Warehouse Capacity

The Department of Homeland Security put the brakes on acquiring additional industrial warehouses for immigrant detention, two senior DHS officials confirmed, though both warned the pause could prove temporary as the agency recalibrates under new leadership and mounting legal pressure.

The halt came in the first week of newly confirmed Secretary Markwayne Mullin, whose arrival at the department prompted an internal ICE memo directing officials to slow the contracting process for converting warehouses into large-scale holding facilities. According to the memo, proposals for the facilities were also to be revised to incorporate feedback from local stakeholders before moving forward, a notable departure from the secretive, accelerated approach that defined the program under former Secretary Kristi Noem.

The warehouse expansion program was a central pillar of the Trump administration's mass deportation infrastructure, funded by $45 billion allocated under last summer's reconciliation package specifically to expand immigrant detention. ICE had already purchased warehouses in ten locations: Romulus, Michigan; Roxbury, New Jersey; Social Circle and Oakwood, Georgia; Tremont and Hamburg, Pennsylvania; Surprise, Arizona; El Paso and San Antonio, Texas; and Williamsport, Maryland. The agency had plans to acquire up to 24 facilities nationwide, capable of holding more than 90,000 detainees combined. The largest planned facilities would hold up to 10,000 people, twice the capacity of the largest existing ICE detention center.

The pause also unfolded against a backdrop of legal challenges and an inspector general investigation into potential contracting irregularities involving Noem and her top adviser, Corey Lewandowski, who had functioned as a "special government employee" during her tenure. Community opposition had also been fierce and sustained. In Oakwood, Georgia, the city council received a standing ovation after unanimously voting to demand that DHS halt construction until environmental and infrastructure questions were answered. A federal judge ordered a 14-day halt to construction at the Williamsport, Maryland facility after the state sued, citing environmental harm; DHS had paid $102.4 million for that site and later awarded a $113 million contract for its conversion. Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro publicly declared opposition to warehouses in his state, and communities from New Jersey to Mississippi pushed back on plans they said were opaque and potentially devastating to local emergency services and infrastructure.

ICE had originally aimed to activate all warehouse facilities by November 30, 2026, under what it called the "ICE Detention Reengineering Initiative," which sought to implement what the agency described as a new detention model by September 30 of this year. Whether Mullin's pause signals a genuine reassessment or a brief administrative reset before the program resumes at full speed remains an open question, one two senior officials declined to answer definitively.