Trump Wants to Build Massive New Detention Centers. States Are Blocking Their Construction.

This article is part of the TPM Café, the TPM opinion and news analysis site.

Last week, ICE released its own inspection report on Camp East Montana, the Texas detention center that has become a symbol of the administration’s overfunded, overcrowded and underregulated mass detention project — where past reports found staff betting on which detainee might be next to commit suicide. The new findings were not disclosed by the defenders or revealed by investigative journalists. They came from the agency itself: 49 failures in medical care, disease control and surveillance; undocumented use of force; inadequate response to sexual assault. The federal government’s own auditors have documented the suffering, and the federal government will do nothing about it.

But while Washington absorbs the daily torrent of executive orders, social media provocations and congressional paralysis, something important is happening at another level of the American government. States are acting – aggressively, creatively and increasingly concertedly – ​​to impose accountability on a detention system explicitly designed to avoid it.

The scale of what has been built is staggering. Nearly 70,000 people are detained, an increase of more than 70% since the end of the Biden administration. Children were reportedly deprived of medical care, access to drinking water and hygiene products and were deprived of sleep. Widespread allegations of overcrowding and sexual assault in facilities. Deaths in ICE custody hit a two-decade high in 2025 — even as inspections of ICE detention centers fell more than 36% — and are on track to surpass that record this year. More people, fewer inspectors and a private detention industry that gleefully profits from every body behind bars.

States will not stand idly by.

For generations, liberals have been ambivalent about state-level power — distrustful of the other “f-word,” federalism, and its ugly history as a shield against oppression. This distrust was, for a time, understandable. But it was expensive. Conservatives understood decades ago that states are essential sites of power and that by acting in concert, they can change narratives, move markets, and generate pressure that no state can produce on its own. ALEC has spent 50 years moving model bills from capital to capital through trusted networks of like-minded legislators. The left has ceded this ground for too long. But state lawmakers who share a vision of the public good are finally getting it back.

Leaders across the country know that the old aversion to state power is no longer a plausible posture. As New Mexico State Rep. Eleanor Chavez, co-chair of the State Futures Federal Response Coalition, said on a press call last week: “New Mexico will not participate in the business of human misery. » New Mexico just signed HB9 into law, prohibiting public agencies from entering into agreements with ICE to detain immigrants for civil detention. The consequence is concrete and immediate: the largest detention center in New Mexico will have to close this year. This is what it looks like when a state exercises its power for the public good.

New Mexico is far from alone. State Futures, the organization I founded in 2025, is currently tracking more than 200 state-level immigration and rule of law bills underway in 31 states. The range of tools deployed is striking and very encouraging.

Breaking off cooperation. Twelve states – including California, Colorado, Delaware, Illinois, Maryland, Oregon and Washington – have limited or prohibited state and local law enforcement from cooperating with federal immigrant detention activities, including 287(g) agreements that delegate federal enforcement authority to local law enforcement. Many other states have proposed similar bills.

Regulate and tax private detention. New Jersey lawmakers have proposed a 50 percent tax on the gross receipts of private immigrant detention centers, with profits going to an immigrant protection fund. This is a direct attack on the financial model that makes mass detention profitable.

Establishing rights for detained people. Washington gives detained people a private right of action – the ability to sue for monetary relief or an injunction when their rights under state law are violated. GEO Group, a federal contractor that operates ICE facilities, tried unsuccessfully to block the law, which remains in effect for now. Massachusetts is considering a bill that would guarantee detained people meaningful access to information in their native language, access to an attorney and telephone access.

Zoning and health standards. Maryland restricts the conditions under which zoning variances and permits can be issued for private detention centers, and is considering a bill to further restrict zoning and another requiring facilities to meet minimum water and sewer standards. Illinois is considering a bill that would ban detention centers within 1,500 feet of schools, daycares, parks and places of worship. Colorado is considering allowing its Department of Public Health to require facilities to meet health and safety standards.

Transparency. Maine requires law enforcement to keep records whenever federal immigration authorities request a person’s detention. Illinois requires an annual report to the state attorney general on immigration enforcement requests. Minnesota is considering requiring vehicles used to detain and transport people to be marked as law enforcement. Washington lawmakers have proposed both a statewide registry of all detention centers and mandatory reporting of serious incidents to the Department of Health.

Supervisory authority. Colorado requires annual health inspections of detention centers. Washington has implemented routine inspections by its Department of Health. New York plans to create a legislative committee dedicated to oversight of detention centers.

These efforts are not limited to the deep blue trio states. Bills are pending in Wisconsin, Arizona, and Pennsylvania to limit or prohibit state and local law enforcement cooperation with federal immigration detention activities, among other things. Even where adoption is unlikely, they serve a purpose: They tell voters that their representatives care, are outraged, and intend to keep fighting.

Beyond legislation, state leaders are taking legal action, demanding physical access to facilities, and making the fight visible. They are responding to a wave of opposition from residents and activists concerned about everything from transparency to lost tax revenue to the impact on the community. And they do it together. A new State Futures Federal Response Coalition now brings together 113 lawmakers from 36 states, which together are home to 80% of the U.S. population. This broad and powerful coalition of state leaders shares strategy, aligns on model bills, and ensures that a breakthrough or idea in one capital spreads quickly to the next — finally, a counterweight to state-level organizing and collaboration on the right.

Nearly 70,000 people are currently detained by immigration authorities, roughly the population of Scranton, Pennsylvania, in facilities invisible by design, and an administration that intends to increase that number. But it’s also the story of something quietly growing: State lawmakers are discovering they have more authority than they thought, more allies than they thought, and more obligations than they could ignore. The federal government documented the suffering at Camp East Montana and walked away. States enter the scene.