The Trump administration is ramping up plans to detain undocumented immigrants at military sites across the United States, a significant expansion of efforts by the White House to use wartime resources to make good on the president’s promised mass deportations.
President Trump’s team is developing a deportation hub at Fort Bliss, near El Paso, Texas, that could eventually hold up to 10,000 undocumented immigrants as they go through the process of being deported, according to three officials familiar with the plan.
Fort Bliss would serve as a model as the administration aims to develop more detention facilities on military sites across the country — from Utah to the area near Niagara Falls — to hold potentially thousands more people and make up for a shortfall of space at Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities, the officials said. They spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss details of a plan that is still in its early stages and has not yet been finalized.
Previous administrations have held some immigrants at military bases, most recently children who would then be released into the country to the care of relatives or friends. The bases served as an emergency backup when the federal government’s shelter system for migrant children reached capacity.
But the Trump administration plan would expand that practice by establishing a nationwide network of military detention facilities for immigrants who are subject to deportation. The proposal would mark a major escalation in the militarization of immigration enforcement after Mr. Trump made clear when he came into office that he wanted to rely even more on the Pentagon to curtail immigration.
For Trump officials, the plan helps address a shortage of space for holding the vast number of people they hope to arrest and deport. But it also raises serious questions about the possibility of redirecting military resources and training schedules. Military officials say the impact would depend on the scale of arrests and how long detainees remained in custody. And advocates for immigrants point to a history of poor conditions for immigrants held in military facilities.
Gil Kerlikowske, the former commissioner of Customs and Border Protection, said military facilities are not designed for a project like this.
“It’s beyond odd,” Mr. Kerlikowske said. “Securing the people is labor intensive and it could also be resource intensive.”
Mr. Trump has made the promise of mass deportation a centerpiece of his presidency after a campaign in which American voters across party lines shifted to the right on immigration.
So far, the Pentagon has deployed 5,000 active duty troops and National Guard members to the southern border to assist the Border Patrol, with the goal of doubling that number in coming weeks.
It also flew a small number of migrants to Guantánamo Bay, before transferring all of them this week to other countries. It has released photos and videos to promote Mr. Trump’s crackdown, including close-up shots of immigrants in shackles.
But the administration is not yet arresting immigrants at a rate that would fill a nationwide network of military facilities. ICE officers made more than 15,000 arrests between Jan. 21 and Feb. 13, according to the Department of Homeland Security. That’s an average of just under 700 arrests a day, more than double the typical daily rate in recent years, including during the Biden administration, but far short of what White House officials want.
It is not clear how many immigrants could be held at the various military facilities given that the Trump administration will likely develop new tent encampments on the space surrounding them. But the plans to rely on military bases in more than a dozen states would be a major expansion of detention capacity.
Some military facilities, like Fort Bliss, are more prepared to house migrants given that previous administrations have detained migrants there in the past. But a surge of thousands of people could put a strain on the facilities’ perimeter security forces. The military could be forced to bring in reinforcements at the different bases, which could disrupt their regular duties and scheduled trainings.
Officials expect to hold just 1,000 immigrants at Fort Bliss in the initial phase of its detention expansion, but it could ultimately hold many more. The Trump administration is already moving some people to Fort Bliss before deporting them.
The White House referred requests for comment about the plan to the Defense and Homeland Security Departments, which did not respond to those requests. Stephen Miller, Mr. Trump’s deputy chief of staff, on Thursday emphasized Mr. Trump’s intent to continue leaning on Defense Department resources for immigration enforcement.
“He has opened up Guantánamo Bay and he’s using military aircraft to carry out deportations all across this country,” Mr. Miller said during a White House press briefing. “You do not come here illegally. You will not get in.”
The Trump administration picked Fort Bliss as the starting point for the expansion after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth visited troops at the base earlier this month.
Responding to questions about plans for holding migrants and deportees at U.S. military bases, and the associated costs, Mr. Hegseth said: “Any assets necessary at the Defense Department to support the expulsion and detention of those in our country illegally are on the table.”
Once the administration finishes evaluating the detentions at Fort Bliss over about the next two months, it is considering expanding and detaining migrants at military bases. Those would include military facilities, including Air Force bases, along the border but also in Florida, New Jersey, Utah, New Mexico, Colorado, Oregon, Minnesota, Wyoming, Washington, Northern California and near Niagara Falls in upstate New York to assist in its plans for immigration roundups in the interior of the country, according to federal officials.
The Trump administration is strapped for detention beds to hold immigrants because of limited budget resources. As a result, ICE has generally only detained around 40,000 individuals in private prisons and local jails across the country in recent weeks. That’s down from the first Trump administration, when the agency held more than 50,000 in ICE beds. The use of military resources and facilities throughout the country provides the agency with easy-to-access beds to hold immigrants soon after they are arrested by ICE agents.
“They’re running out of existing ICE facilities, they’re running out of bed space,” said Theresa Cardinal Brown, a former policy adviser for Customs and Border Protection.
The detention of migrants at facilities like Fort Bliss has also in the past prompted scrutiny over the federal government’s treatment of immigrants.
After the Biden administration housed thousands of migrant children at the facility, an internal watchdog for the Department of Health and Human Services found children and teenagers there suffered distress and panic attacks because of a lack of resources and training by officials. Some migrants were held for two months before they were released into the United States. Some former U.S. immigration officials privately expressed concern that the administration’s plan to use military bases could lay the ground work for long-term detention of migrants.
As of now, Trump administration officials say they are planning on using the bases as a holding facility before the immigrants can be deported.
Reporting was contributed by Reyes Mata III at the U.S.-Mexico border and Helene Cooper in Washington.
