US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is planning to spend an estimated $38.3bn converting warehouses across the country into massive detention centres, according to documents released by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The plans, which detail a network of facilities with capacity for tens of thousands of detainees, represent a major escalation of President Trump’s immigration agenda.
The documents, published on the New Hampshire state website, reveal that ICE intends to acquire and retrofit 24 buildings. Sixteen of these will serve as regional processing centres, each holding between 1,000 and 1,500 people, while another eight large-scale centres will accommodate 7,000 to 10,000 detainees and act as the primary locations for deportations. Detainees would spend an average of three to seven days at processing sites before being transferred to the larger centres, where they would be held for about 60 days before deportation.
One proposed facility in Merrimack, New Hampshire, is expected to cost $158m to retrofit and an additional $146m to operate in its first three years. The DHS estimates the overall programme will require $38.3bn and is funded by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act passed by Congress. The documents state that the new model is needed to handle a surge in ICE hires and an anticipated rise in arrests, as the number of people in ICE detention has hit record levels during the second Trump administration.
There appear to be conflicting statements about when the economic impact analysis for the Merrimack facility was provided to New Hampshire Governor Kelly Ayotte. Ayotte said DHS supplied the documents for the first time on Thursday, but ICE Acting Director Todd Lyons told a Senate hearing earlier that same day that officials had already discussed the project with the governor and provided a summary.
Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey issued a strong statement opposing the creation of the Merrimack detention centre, calling it “outrageous and absolutely the wrong move”. She criticised ICE’s tactics, saying: “ICE is shooting people dead on the street. Mothers have been ripped from cars and separated from children. … Parents are afraid to send kids to school, to go to church, to seek healthcare and report crimes.” Healey added: “We should be opposing ICE’s tactics, not allowing them to expand. We certainly should not be allowing ICE to build new human warehouses when they can’t be trusted to keep people safe and protect due process.”
