Trump Administration’s Plans for ICE Detention on Bay Area Military Base Are On Hold

While the Trump administration aggressively expands immigration detention nationwide, including a 2,500-bed private prison just opened in California’s Mojave Desert, a controversial plan to build an immigration jail at Travis Air Force Base in Fairfield is now on hold.

Rep. Mike Thompson, whose district surrounds the base on three sides, said he was relieved to get a letter last month from the Department of Defense confirming the proposal has been taken off the table, following strenuous opposition.

“I’m pleased, as is Travis, that they decided not to move forward with the detention center on the base. Nobody wanted it,” the North Bay Democrat said. “The base was against it, the community was against it, two members of Congress from there were against it.”

The push to build a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center on the air base came to light in April through internal federal emails obtained by KQED. The emails showed significant coordination among Department of Defense and Homeland Security officials to expedite the plans and tee them up for approval by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

The plan came as a shock to Thompson and Rep. John Garamendi, another Democrat whose district includes the base. They expressed outrage that the Trump administration had not informed them of the plan and concern that using military resources for civilian law enforcement could violate the Posse Comitatus Act and divert from missions such as supplying weapons to Ukraine and allies in the Pacific.

On May 5, the pair fired off a letter to Hegseth saying: “The decision to use Travis AFB as a migrant detention center would both constitute a dangerous militarization of immigration enforcement and unnecessarily degrade military readiness.”

For weeks, opposition mounted, with protests outside the base, constituents calling the congressmen and many local elected officials speaking out, including the mayor of Fairfield.

At a May 29 meeting of the Travis Community Consortium, Travis’ commanding officer, then-Col. Jay Johnson, reported that there had been talks about establishing an ICE facility on the base, but he said that plan had been taken off the table, at least for the time being, according to Garamendi staff who attended the meeting.

Finally, on Aug. 6, the congressmen received an official reply from Assistant Secretary of Defense M. Roosevelt Ditlevson that read, in part: “While DoD remains committed to supporting the Department of Homeland Security within the framework of applicable legal authorities and through approved requests for assistance, Travis AFB will not be designated for migrant detention-related activities at this time.”

Garamendi and Thompson spoke about the shift in plans to KQED this week.

“The argument that Mike Thompson and I made carried the day. Travis is a critical element in our national security,” Garamendi said. “The role that Travis has as an international distribution center for military supplies, equipment, and personnel is critical to everything the military must do. And a detention facility would degrade that mission.”

Garamendi and Thompson called it a win but said they would remain vigilant, as defense officials have approved immigration jails on military bases in other states, including New Jersey and Indiana and a 5,000-bed installation at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas.

“With this administration, you don’t really have a clear understanding of what is going to change from one moment to the next,” Thompson said. “So we’re watching it. We’re in constant communication with the base personnel.”

Situating ICE jails on military bases can facilitate the swift removal of immigrants from the country. Although most deportation flights are conducted with ICE Air charter planes, the administration has also conducted at least 85 removal flights on military cargo planes, a new report from Human Rights First found.

Over the last year in California, ICE has held an average of roughly 3,600 people a day across six facilities, all of them private prison operations in Southern California.

ICE officials have been seeking a detention center in Northern California, which has a major ICE field office and three immigration courts — in San Francisco, Concord and Sacramento.

“ICE is exploring all options in California to meet its current and future detention requirements, which include new detention facilities and possible support from partner agencies,” an ICE official told KQED in a written statement in April.