Big Take Inside ICE’s Plan to Build Detention ‘Mega Centers’
6 snips
Jan 20, 2026 
Fola Akinnibi and Sophie Alexander, Bloomberg reporters specializing in immigration and detention policy, delve into ICE's controversial plan to expand detention through 'mega centers.' They discuss the shift from temporary tent facilities to converted warehouses, raising concerns about safety and poor conditions for detainees. With a $45 billion funding allocation prompting faster solutions, they highlight the competition among companies vying for lucrative contracts and the local pushback from communities opposing these massive facilities.
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Scale Of Detention Expansion
- The Trump administration aims to detain vastly more people, targeting up to 100,000 beds to meet a goal of one million deportations per year.
- That scale change forces ICE to seek nontraditional detention spaces like tents and warehouses, raising novel logistical and safety challenges.
Tents Proved Unsustainable
- Temporary tent facilities were used to quickly add capacity but produced poor conditions and high costs to operate long-term.
- Those shortcomings pushed ICE to consider hard-sided warehouse conversions as a next step.
Pressure To Abandon Asylum Cases
- Reported poor conditions in temporary facilities push detainees to abandon legal fights and accept deportation.
- One former worker said the system would need to move people out in under a month to meet deportation targets.
