The California Bear Will Be Target in Next ICE Surge

By many indications, it appears that California will be one of the targets of the next “ICE surge.” Even though there won’t be any surge during this current government shutdown, ICE still is currently expanding its physical presence across the country. Its parent, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is carrying out a hush-hush campaign to open up 250 facilities and offices in nearly every state, and the Golden State — long a demises for Trump — is at the top of the list.

Check out the following coming down in California:

• Irvine: New offices at 2020 Main Street, located directly adjacent to a childcare agency.
• Los Angeles: General expansion of existing federal office spaces.
• Sacramento: Security upgrades and expansion at the John E. Moss building, which houses a DOJ immigration court.
• San Diego: Growth at the Edward J. Schwartz Courthouse and federal building.
• Santa Ana: Expansion at the Santa Ana federal building, situated blocks from a church and a major high school football stadium.
• Van Nuys (Los Angeles): Expansion at the James C. Corman federal building.

This secret federal government campaign to purchase warehouses for the massive expansion of ICE is now known due to documents posted online late last week by  Republican New Hampshire Gov. Kelly Ayotte. Also, a federal official said that California — and New York are among the “next” for a surge similar to the campaign in Minneapolis. These plans include embedding hundreds of new ICE offices in Sacramento, Irvine, Santa Ana and Van Nuys, according to an explosive report by WIRED magazine.

Federal immigration officials plan to spend $38.3 billion to boost detention capacity to 92,600 beds, a document released Friday shows, as U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement quietly purchases warehouses to turn into detention and processing facilities. …

It said ICE plans 16 regional processing centers with a population of 1,000 to 1,500 detainees, whose stays would average three to seven days. Another eight large-scale detention centers would be capable of housing 7,000 to 10,000 detainees for periods averaging less than 60 days.

The document also refers to the acquisition of 10 existing “turnkey” facilities.

According to the WIRED report, ICE is leasing space in two Orange County cities — at an office park in Irvine and at the federal building in Santa Ana. [There is a paywall at WIRED, so see this embedded link.]

California is not the only target. Much of the ICE expansion of its facilities is or will be just outside of the country’s largest metropolitan areas.

In many cases, these facilities, which are to be used by street-level agents and ICE attorneys, are located near elementary schools, medical offices, places of worship, and other sensitive locations.

In El Paso, Texas, for example, the agency is moving into a large campus of buildings right off of Interstate 10 near multiple local health providers and other businesses. …

In New York, ICE is moving into offices on Long Island near a passport center.

In a wealthy community near Houston, Texas, ICE appears poised to move into an office building blocks away from a preschool.

The General Services Administration (GSA) manages federal buildings and functions as the government’s internal IT department, and it’s “playing a critical role in this aggressive expansion. In numerous emails and memorandums viewed by WIRED, DHS asked GSA explicitly to disregard usual government lease procurement procedures and even hide lease listings due to “national security concerns” in an effort to support ICE’s immigration enforcement activities across the US.”

In documents viewed by WIRED, ICE has repeatedly outlined its expansion to cities around the US. The September memorandum citing “unusual and compelling urgency” for office expansion states that OPLA will be “expanding its legal operations” into Birmingham, Alabama; Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers, Jacksonville, and Tampa, Florida; Des Moines, Iowa; Boise, Idaho; Louisville, Kentucky; Baton Rouge, Louisiana; Grand Rapids, Michigan; St. Louis, Missouri; Raleigh, North Carolina; Long Island, New York; Columbus, Ohio; Oklahoma City, Oklahoma; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Charleston and Columbia, South Carolina; Nashville, Tennessee; Richmond, Virginia; Spokane, Washington and Coeur d’Alene, Idaho; and Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The memorandum also states that the existing offices are at maximum capacity and will “require additional space” to accommodate the new employees hired. At the time, the memo states that OPLA had selected almost 1,000 attorneys to hire. [See Patch for more.]

In the meantime, ICE has quietly purchased at least seven warehouses — some larger than 1 million square feet  — in the past few weeks in Arizona, Georgia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Texas.

It’s also important to note that when many communities heard about ICE plans to purchase or lease local warehouses, people rose up and pressured buyers or lessors not to engage with ICE in six cities. This happened even in red cities or counties.

This type and level of activism looks to be in California’s future, and hopefully Californians can rise to the levels manifested by residents of Minneapolis during their ICE surge. The ol’ California bear has been poked.