February 7, 2026

February 7, 2026 Yesterday, two right-wing circuit judges

signed off on the Trump administration's new mass detention policy. The extraordinary assertion

that vast numbers of non-citizens throughout the country can be arrested and held in detention

centers without the right to release until they are deported.

As Steve Latic explained in December in one first, this new policy dramatically expanded the number

of immigrants suddenly subject to arrest and long-term detention. U.S. judges overwhelmingly rejected

the new policy. Latic quoted Politico's Kyle Cheney, who reported that in more than 700 cases,

at least 225 judges, appointed by all modern presidents, including 23 appointed by Trump,

have ruled that the new policy likely violates both the law and the right to do process.

But the administration handpicked a right-wing circuit to rule on the policy,

and last night, as Latic explained today in one first, Judge Edith Jones and Judge Kyle Duncan

of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, okayed the Trump administration's new rule,

denying detained immigrants the right to release on bond. That includes, as Latic wrote,

millions of non-citizens who have been here for generations, who have never committed a crime,

and who pose neither a risk of flight nor any threat to public safety.

It is likely the plaintiffs will appeal the decision. This policy has dramatically increased

detention of immigrants. Before it, the U.S. held about 40,000 people on any given day.

Now, according to Laura Strickler and Julia Ainsley of NBC News, the United States is currently

holding more than 70,000 immigrants in 224 facilities across the nation, 104 more facilities

than it had before Trump took office. Those detainees include children.

Private prison companies, under contract with the U.S. government, operate these detention

facilities, including the $1.2 billion camp East Montana located at Fort Bliss Army Base in Texas,

where a medical examiner recently ruled the death of detainee Haraldo Luna's Campos,

a homicide. The cause of the January death of Victor Manuel Diaz there remains unclear,

although officials claim it was presumed suicide. A third man, Francisco Gaspar Andres,

died in December after being transported from the camp to an El Paso hospital for treatment for

a serious medical condition. On January 20, Judd Legum of Popular Information reported that

ICE stopped paying third-party providers for medical care for detainees on October 3, 2025,

and that it would not start even to process claims again until at least April 30, 2026.

It told medical providers to hold all claims submissions until then. A source in the administration

told Legum that some medical providers are now denying detainees medical care. From 2002 to 2023,

the Department of Veterans Affairs, or VA, helped to make sure detainees had medical care if an

ICE facility couldn't provide it, with ICE paying the VA for the coverage. But in 2023,

Alabama Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville lied that President Joe Biden was robbing veterans

to pay off illegals. And on September 30, 2025, a small, right-wing nonprofit sued to get documents

from the Trump administration about the VA's role in detainee care. On October 3,

Legum discovered the VA abruptly and instantly terminated its agreement with ICE, leaving it

with no way to provide prescribed medication or access off-site care. According to Legum, ICE said

it could not provide dialysis, prenatal care, oncology, and chemotherapy. ICE officials

described the loss of care as an absolute emergency that needed an immediate solution to prevent

any further medical complications or loss of life. But it did not get solved.

Douglas McMillan, Samuel Oakford, and Kirkpatrick, and Aaron Schaefer of the Washington Post,

reported that according to ICE's own oversight unit, Camp East Montana at Fort Bliss, Texas,

has violated at least 60 federal standards for immigrant detention. The contract for the $1.24

billion project was awarded to a small business that operates out of a residential address,

and has, as Lyndon German of VPM News reported, little to no publicly available record of managing

immigration facilities. Last April, at the Border Security Expo in Phoenix, Arizona,

acting director of ICE Todd Lyons told attendees, we need to get better at treating this like a business.

He called for a deportation process like Amazon Prime, but with human beings.

In the Republicans July 2025 Budget Reconciliation Bill, which they call the One Big Beautiful Bill Act,

they put $45 billion into additional funding for ICE detention.

In November and December, NBC News and Bloomberg reported that the Trump administration was

considering mega-centres for detaining people.

Fola Aknibe, Sophie Alexander, Alicia A. Caldwell, and Rachel Adams Hurd of Bloomberg reported

that in November, ICE issued a $29.9 million contract just below the threshold of $30 million

that would require open bidding to KPB Services LLC for due diligence services and concept design

for processing centers and mega-centres throughout the United States.

In December, Douglas McMillan and Jonathan O'Connell of the Washington Post reported that the

administration was working to put in place a national detention system that would book newly

arrested detainees into processing sites before sending them to one of seven warehouses that

would hold 5,000 to 10,000 people each. McMillan and O'Connell reported that 16 smaller warehouses

would hold up to 1,500 people each. From there, people would be deported.

These will not be warehouses. They will be very well-structured detention facilities meeting our

regular detention standards. A DHS spokesperson wrote to Angela Cocherga and Diane Solis of KERA News

in Texas. It should not come as news that ICE will be making arrests in states across the US

and is actively working to expand detention space.

Strickler and Ainsley reported Thursday that the Department of Homeland Security has already

secured at least three facilities. It paid $87.4 million for one outside Philadelphia and $37

million for another outside San Antonio, a warehouse of nearly 640,000 square feet.

ICE bought a building the size of seven football fields in Surprise, Arizona outside Phoenix for $70 million.

But there is increasing criticism of the new warehouses as Americans mobilize against the

violence and abuse of ICE and Border Patrol. Officials from Surprise answered concerns about

the federal facility, with a statement saying, the city was not aware that there were efforts

underway to purchase the building, was not notified of the transaction by any of the parties involved,

and has not been contacted by DHS or any federal agency about the intended use of the building.

It's important to note federal projects are not subject to local regulations, such as zoning.

On Tuesday, February 3rd, more than 1,000 people turned out for the Surprise City Council meeting

to oppose the establishment of the Federal Detention Center.

One of the speakers reminded the Council of Ordruf, the first Nazi camp liberated by US troops

on April 4th, 1945. He said,

The US Army brought the leading citizens of Ordruf to tour the facility, which turned out to be part

of the Buchenwald network of concentration camps. A US Army colonel told the German civilians who viewed

the scenes without muttering a word that they were to blame. One of the Germans replied that what

happened in the camp was done by a few people, and you cannot blame us all.

And the American, who could have been any one of our grandfathers, said,

This was done by those that the German people chose to lead them, and all are responsible.

The morning after the tour, the mayor of Ordruf killed himself.

And maybe he did not know the full extent of the outrages that were committed in his community,

but he knew enough. And we don't know exactly how ICE will use this warehouse.

But we know enough. I ask you to consider what the mayor of Ordruf might have thought before he

died. Maybe he felt like a victim. He might have thought, how is this my fault? I had no jurisdiction

over this. Maybe he would have said, this site was not subject to local zoning. What could I do?

But I think when he reflected on the suffering that occurred at this camp just outside of town,

that those words would have sounded hollow even to him. Because it is heart, he knew,

as we do, that we are all responsible for what happens in our community.

Letters from an American was written and read by Heather Cox Richardson. It was produced at

Soundscape Productions, Dead in Massachusetts, recorded with music composed by Michael Moss.