The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and its Virginia and North Carolina affiliates have filed a lawsuit against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), requesting the release of records detailing the agency's planned expansion of detention centers in Virginia.
Central to the lawsuit, which was filed on October 1 in the United District Court for the Southern District of New York, is a Request for Information (RFI) issued by ICE on May 28. The RFI sought to identify "single adult facilities" within a two-hour drive of Richmond International Airport in Virginia that had 1,000 to 1,500 beds, to serve as additional ICE detention centers under the jurisdiction of the agency's D.C. Enforcement and Removal Operations division.
On August 8, the ACLU submitted a FOIA request seeking all records related to the solicitation—including submitted proposals, internal communications, and evaluation records. ICE acknowledged receipt but did not produce any documents within the required timeframe, prompting the lawsuit. The complaint asserts that ICE failed to issue any formal response or legal justification for its withholding—which violates the FOIA statute requiring federal agencies to respond within 20 business days. As a result, the ACLU states in its filing that "Plaintiffs have exhausted all administrative remedies regarding [ICE's] failure to respond."
While not the impetus behind the lawsuit, the litigation comes in the wake of what Virginia ACLU attorney Sophia Gregg has described as an ongoing "humanitarian crisis," citing concerns over the "rapidly deteriorating conditions" at ICE's temporary detention centers. This includes the agency's temporary holding facility in Chantilly, Virginia, where detainees have allegedly been denied meals, basic medical care, and access to due process, according to a recent MSNBC investigation.
The concern isn't just humanitarian though. The lawsuit, as Vanguard News Group points out, also raises questions of transparency. As the filing states, "Obtaining information about government activity, analyzing that information, and widely publishing and disseminating it to the press and the public is a critical and substantial component of the ACLU's work."
"The public has a right to know how ICE is planning to extend its network of detention centers," ACLU attorney Michele Delgado clarified, "especially when tens of thousands of people are already held in these facilities every day under conditions that raise human rights concerns."
Eunice Cho, senior counsel at the ACLU's National Prison Project, underscored the broader stakes of the lawsuit, declaring that citizens deserve access to information on how their "taxpayer dollars are being used to expand the abusive ICE detention machine."
The Virginia case is only the latest in a growing wave of litigation aimed at exposing the Department of Homeland Security's quiet efforts to expand detention infrastructure—efforts tied to the current administration's push to fulfill Donald Trump's 2024 campaign promise to deport over 11 million illegal immigrants. A similar lawsuit was filed by the ACLU of Colorado on September 23, after ICE failed to release records detailing plans to expand detention capacity in the state. Some of these filings, the ACLU notes, have already forced disclosures of internal documents outlining blueprints for the construction of new facilities in the South, Midwest, and West Coast.
Recent reporting by Reason further highlights the scale and opacity of the department's expansion strategy. In July, ICE announced plans to spend $1.26 billion on the construction of a large-scale detention complex in Texas without any apparent public consultation or transparency around the siting and construction process. In September, Reason documented a wave of severe tracking failures at Florida's new state-run immigration detention centers, where hundreds of incarcerated non-citizens have reportedly been removed from the Online Detainee Locator System (ODLS)—a federal database that allows family members, attorneys, and the public to locate and monitor the detention status of individuals in ICE custody. Each of these developments point toward a rapidly growing detention apparatus operating with nominal transparency.
As for now, the Virginia case remains pending. But if successful, it could provide one of the first detailed glimpses into how ICE aims to expand its detention network in the Mid-Atlantic region.
The post ACLU Sues ICE Over Withheld Records for Virginia Detention Expansion appeared first on Reason.com.
