Read our story for more about the situation at Fort Bliss, where more than 1,400 people are being held despite these and other serious concerns about the conditions.

w/ @samueloakford.bsky.social, N. Kirkpatrick & @aaronschaffer.com www.washingtonpost.com/business/202...

Despite having a "dietician-approved" menu, people were being widely underfed. The facility planned to increase meal calories by 30%, but as of early Sept that had not happened yet, the ICE inspectors wrote.

Medical care was deficient:

💉 Medical charts left empty, health screenings never documented.

💊 One person was given psychotropic drugs but there was no record of them consenting to it.

😔 Another person was placed on suicide watch but there was no record of anyone watching them.

The facility lacked basic many policies and procedures required by ICE:

❌ No security plan
❌ No policies for helping the disabled
❌ No policy on strip searching
❌ No directions to guards on using lethal force, which inspectors called a "serious vulnerability"

Because it's an active construction site, only 1/4 planned recreation areas was built, so it had to be shared by 1200+ detainees. They each got 40 min recreation a few times a week. "This lack of recreation time is adding to the detainees' visible frustrations and unruliness" the inspectors wrote.

For weeks detainees were held virtually incommunicado. No phones, no visits with families, lawyers or ICE deportation officers to learn about their cases. Tablets used to make calls didn't work. "Most of them wanted to
know the status of their immigration case," inspectors wrote.

Explore ICE's planned facilities in your region or download the entire list of 125 new and expanded facilities using the handy table inside our story: wapo.st/45hE9fq

Other notable facilities slated to open:

-Puerto Rico's only large-scale ICE detention center
-Minnesota's only private prison
-California City facility will become largest ICE center in CA
-Irwin, a Georgia detention center closed after women alleged medical abuse
-Military bases in NJ & IN

Trump's ICE believes bigger is better. Number of detention centers over 1,000 beds:

Now: 29
End of year: 49

Photo: Ft. Bliss soft-sided detention site in Texas, expected to hold up to 5,000 migrants. (REUTERS/Paul Ratje)

One of the newly planned family centers for parents and children will be inside Reeves, a gigantic, 5,700-bed former federal prison known for understaffing, poor medical care and inmate rioting.

Reeves video by www.youtube.com/@zoukisconsu...

Trump plans to open at least two new family detention facilities, more than doubling the record for total family capacity set under the Obama and first Trump administrations.

ICE also plans to expand in states with few existing detention beds, including Oklahoma, Indiana, Minnesota, North Carolina and Tennessee.

Number of states that can hold over 1,000 ICE detainees:

Now: 14
End of year: 19

Four states now account for the majority of ICE’s detention space: Texas, Louisiana, California and Georgia. That will continue, with new facilities in Texas alone expected to double the state’s capacity to an incredible 38,000 beds by year-end.

Asked about the rationale for this move, a city council member said "mass murders and shootings are at an all-time high."

In fact, there were 310 fatal and nonfatal shootings in New Orleans last year — by far the LOWEST number in the 14 years the city council has published these statistics.