Newport Sues DHS Over Plan for Oregon’s First Permanent ICE Detention Center

The coastal Oregon town, Newport, has filed a lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) over a planned immigration detention facility for ICE detainees.

Lawsuit Filed Over Newport ICE Detention Facility

Newport, a fishing, tourism, and marine research hub of just 10,000 residents, says that DHS plans to build “a remote black site” for ICE detainees without seeking public comment and has sued the agency to stop it from creating the planned immigration detention and deportation facility at the town’s small, municipal airport.

At Newport Municipal Airport, the U.S. Coast Guard uses a 3.5-acre property where its rescue helicopter is kept. Earlier this month, Oregon won a lawsuit to bring the helicopter back to Newport after the federal government moved it from the AIRFAC Newport property.

In the lawsuit filed in federal court in Eugene, the town alleges that a major federal contractor began posting job openings seeking people with “DHS or ICE detention center experience,” and federal contractors have inundated local businesses with inquiries about providing services for a facility containing over 200 people.

Newport said that an ICE detention facility of this size will significantly increase wastewater, trash, transportation, and traffic at the site, and this will have a reasonably foreseeable effect on coastal uses, including recreational activities, fishing, and floodplain management.

They argue that the government is violating the Administrative Procedures Act by enacting a plan to build the immigration facility in violation of the Coastal Zone Management Act and the National Environmental Policy Act. Newport is seeking a court order to prevent the construction of the detention facility.

Newport Fights Against Becoming Oregon’s First Dedicated ICE Detention Center

Until now, immigration detention in Oregon has been mostly short-term county jail holds, but if DHS moves forward with its plan, there will be a permanent facility.

But short-term holds have brought their own issues and attracted lawsuits. In a lawsuit filed on October 1 in the Eugene Federal District Court, immigration lawyers and immigrant rights groups asked a federal Judge to force ICE field offices in Oregon to grant attorneys access to their clients before out-of-state transfers, saying ICE agents transfer clients out of state to block attorney access.

Lawyers for ICE say that because Oregon does not have detention facilities and has only field offices with stays or holds limited to 12 hours, detainees are usually transferred out of state quickly. The judge has not yet said when her decision can be expected.