Hi there,

For three decades, people have counted on Democracy Now! to go to where the silence is and cover the people and movements closest to the most important stories of the day. Please donate today to support our independent journalism. Every dollar makes a difference. Thank you so much!

Democracy Now!
Amy Goodman

Non-commercial news needs your support.

We rely on contributions from you, our viewers and listeners to do our work. If you visit us daily or weekly or even just once a month, now is a great time to make your monthly contribution.

Please do your part today.

Donate

Trump Admin Planning to Spend Over $38 Billion to Buy Warehouses and Convert Them into ICE Jails

HeadlineFeb 16, 2026

The Trump administration is planning to spend more than $38 billion to acquire warehouses across the U.S. in order to retrofit them into new ICE jails with capacity for tens of thousands of prisoners. Sixteen large buildings would be converted into regional processing centers, jailing more than 1,000 immigrants at a time, with a further eight large detention centers capable of holding 7,000 to 10,000 prisoners for an average of two months. That’s according to documents first revealed by The Washington Post. This comes as a Reuters review found hundreds of judges around the U.S. have ruled more than 4,400 times since October that President Trump’s administration is detaining immigrants unlawfully. Yet the administration has continued jailing people indefinitely, even after courts ruled the policy was illegal.

The original content of this program is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Please attribute legal copies of this work to democracynow.org. Some of the work(s) that this program incorporates, however, may be separately licensed. For further information or additional permissions, contact us.

Non-commercial news needs your support

We rely on contributions from our viewers and listeners to do our work.
Please do your part today.
Make a donation
Top