CHARLOTTE — U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is considering opening at least three new detention facilities in North Carolina, according to records recently published by the ACLU.
Documents obtained through litigation by the ACLU of North Carolina show the agency is evaluating multiple sites across the state. The potential expansion follows increased activity in the region, including a five-day operation conducted by U.S. Border Patrol agents in Charlotte late last year.
Possible locations for the expansion include the former American Hebrew Academy in Greensboro, the Charlotte Observer reports.
Records obtained by the ACLU also identify another site in the same city referred to as the Greensboro Detention Facility.
The federal government is also considering the use of the Rivers Correctional Institution in Winton, a small community in northeastern North Carolina, the Charlotte Observer reports. That private facility has the capacity to hold 1,000 inmates but has been closed since 2021. The closure occurred after the Biden administration ended contracts with private prison companies.
Reporting from the publication The Assembly last year indicated that ICE might reach a deal to utilize the building.
North Carolina has a history of housing federal detainees in local facilities. ICE previously maintained a contract with Alamance County. Additionally, The News & Observer reported last year that some ICE detainees have been kept at the New Hanover County jail.
Many people currently detained in the region are sent to the Stewart Detention Center in Georgia, which is one of the largest immigration jails in the United States, officials said.
Conditions at that facility have drawn long-standing concerns. Reports have documented various issues at the center, including poor health care and detainees being forced to sleep on the floor.
Michele Delgado, a staff attorney for the North Carolina ACLU, expressed concern regarding the transparency of the agency’s expansion efforts. “ICE has made clear that it relies on secrecy,” Delgado said in a statement. “The heavily redacted documents we obtained through litigation expose disturbing expansion plans.”
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