The Human Currency of ICE and Private Prison Corporations

It all makes sense once you connect the dots.

Throughout Donald Trump's first 100 days, there has been a large push to deploy Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to round up as many "violent" undocumented immigrants as possible. Based on a longstanding campaign promise by Donald Trump and falling in line with the racist and xenophobic views of Stephen Miller, the current regime has been nothing but open in its desire to remove as many individuals as possible in the name of national security. Crying wolf about "open borders" has been a longstanding GOP rallying cry. As the party soaked in nativism, it has to present immigrants as dangerous and destructive. The more they can have ICE visible in the community, arresting black and brown community members, the more they can puff out their chests and claim to be the party of national security.

But here's the thing. 

It's more than a simple political strategy to cater to their shrinking xenophobic base. While it is undoubtedly part of the reason, something larger is at play here. And what's at play is nothing new. In fact, it is essentially the foundation of the modern American conservative party. Yes, they are nativist. Yes, they are racist. Yes, they are xenophobic. Yet at the core of everything, the GOP is opportunistic. They want to secure their own personal wealth and financial well-being. The party of "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" does everything in its power to skirt the rules. To abuse the system. To take advantage of every single loophole. At its core, the Republican Party is nothing more than a Ponzi scheme dedicated to enriching itself at the expense of the American people. When you think in these terms, when you realize that everything the GOP does is to enrich those at the top, then you finally begin to see a pattern that is impossible to ignore. 

Let's revisit ICE for a moment. The department's objective is to keep our borders safe. It is a federal agency that has jurisdiction 100 miles from any land and maritime border. But it can also operate beyond that jurisdiction if given authority by local municipalities. Take Nashville, Tennessee, for example. This past week, the Tennessee Highway Patrol coordinated a series of stops with ICE to find undocumented immigrants along state roads. These stops resulted in the arrests of 12 individuals, with an additional 94 people being detained for reasons related to immigration. Nashville's Democratic mayor has publicly objected to the stops and has questioned how and why the Highway Patrol came to work with ICE in the first place. Knowing that Tennessee is a red, non-border state, it would seem an odd choice to divert ICE manpower and resources there at a time when the Trump Administration loves targeting blue states, especially those with sanctuary laws and policies. What is it about Tennessee, and Nashville specifically, that makes it a priority for Immigration and Customs Enforcement?

The answer: Private prison company CoreCivic. 

One of the dirtiest secrets in American immigration is that while ICE is a federal government agency, the prisons to which it sends most of its detainees are not. In fact, where it sends its detainees is often to private prison companies that have a self-interest in having as many inmates as possible. More inmates mean more funding. More funding means expansion. Expansion shows stability and growth. And stability and growth mean extra money in the pockets of the key investors of these private prison companies, who are accountable to their stockholders and board members.

Let's return to Nashville, the site of private prison company CoreCivic. CoreCivic is the second-largest private prison company in the United States. It has over 70 sites in 21 states, including 4 in Tennessee alone. It has a market capitalization of $2.4 billion. Between Election Day and the announcement of Tom Homan to oversee border control, the company's stock rose 81%, representing a clear relationship between the political party in charge and the private prison industrial complex. Knowing that a surging prison population was good for business, CoreCivic has been pushing the envelope for years at its Trousdale Turner Correctional Facility in Nashville and was actually investigated for civil rights violations in 2024. From The Tennessee Lookout: 

The U.S. Department of Justice has opened an investigation into private prison company CoreCivic and Trousdale Turner Correctional Center, which it manages, over alleged civil rights violations.

Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke announced the move Tuesday morning, citing a record of assaults, murders and understaffing at the facility since it opened in 2016.

“People are incarcerated at Trousdale Turner as punishment for their crimes, but in our legal system, punishment does not and cannot include violence and sexual abuse,” said Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.

“Publicly available information suggests that Trousdale Turner has been plagued by serious problems since it first opened its doors,” said United States Attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee Henry C. Leventis. “This includes reports of staffing shortages, physical and sexual assaults, murders, and a 188% turnover rate among prison guards just last year.”

Despite these allegations, CoreCivic continued to receive support from Republican Governor Bill Lee. Lee promised to take these allegations seriously and the Trousdale Turner location even saw its inmate population decrease from a peak of nearly 2,500 in October of 2023 to under 2,100 in August of 2024. But these "improvements" could not mask the fact that Lee had a vested interest in the prison's continued operations and financial success. As noted by The Tennessee Lookout, CoreCivic gave $69,000 to Lee's latest campaign, a significant sum in terms of Tennessee politics. CoreCivic made a staggering $233 million in profit in 2023 from its statewide prison contracts, and Lee remaining on their good side was critical for his future political ambitions.

The Trousdale facility did not escape accountability entirely. Over 3 years, the facility received roughly $45 million in fines for continually understaffing the location. But this was simply a drop in the bucket for a company the size of CoreCivic. In fact, the state of Tennessee renewed its contract with CoreCivic this past week for three years in the amount of $168 million. With a Trump-infused DOJ unlikely to follow through on its investigation, CoreCivic now has clear sailing to get back to maximizing its prisoner population at sites like Trousdale. In fact, in describing the company's first quarter earnings, CoreCivic's CEO Damon Hininger directly cited bed utilization provided by ICE as a key factor in the increased occupancy of the company's prison locations.

Hence, last week's Nashville raid. 

Knowing CoreCivic's funding was forthcoming, the Tennessee Highway Patrol was likely given the green light to coordinate the raids with ICE. Who that order came from is anybody's guess, but it is extremely unlikely that Governor Lee and other high-ranking state GOP members were unaware of what was going down. Knowing that the Trousdale facility could begin increasing its prison population again without consequences was surely welcome news for all of CoreCivic's key investors. Filling up the Trousdale facility with nearly 100 individuals overnight was a huge boon for business. With no looming DOJ investigation into civil rights violations, CoreCivic felt emboldened to once again revert to the same practices that led to overcrowding in the first place. Why should CoreCivic worry about illegal practices when it has the entire Republican Party on its side?

Following the money is the oldest trope in political accountability. It was made famous during the Nixon-Watergate era. But even today, we tend to lose sight of it in the broader picture. But we have to stay vigilant. Patterns will emerge. Look at other regions where immigration raids have taken place. Who owns the private prisons in those areas? Who benefits in a certain area by rounding up immigrant populations? Because nothing the GOP does is by chance. There's always a larger reason for targeting certain communities. 

While CoreCivic and Nashville remain a powerful example, they're not the only ones. Geo Group, the largest private prison company headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, has also had a busy few months. With 50 centers and an estimated 64,500 beds to fill, Geo Group has been looking to capitalize on the Trump Administration's recent immigration raid efforts and was able to successfully acquire both a $70 million investment in expanding ICE service capabilities in December and a 15-year, $1.2 billion contract with ICE at the end of February to reopen an 1,100-bed ICE facility in Newark, New Jersey. This is the same site that was recently in the news, where Newark Mayor Ras Baraka was detained for questioning the May 1st opening of the site, claiming that Geo Group had neither acquired proper permits nor allowed inspectors into the facility. Mayor Baraka was later released, but not before drawing attention to what will likely be a prolonged legal battle between his administration and the renovated detention center. 

With the group itself centered in Florida, Geo Group's home state has become ground zero for ICE and its controversial 207(g) agreements which have allowed over 200 state, county, and municipal agencies entered into collaboration agreements with ICE, including anyone and everyone from the Florida Highway Patrol, the Florida State Guard, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, the Florida Lottery Commisson, and even campus police. With a late April statewide raid, Florida arrested as many as 1,100 residents who would need housing at one of the state's three facilities, all conveniently owned by Geo Group. From Election Day to early May, the company's stock had more than doubled, proving once again that large-scale incarceration is good for business.

The cruelty is the point, as we all know. But we cannot overstate that so much of this cruelty is driven by profit. Yes, the Stephen Millers of the world are giddy at the thought of tearing apart black and brown families. But equally giddy are those behind-the-scenes investors and CEOs of private prison companies who now have a direct pipeline from ICE to their doors. Recently, here in Boston, Tufts University student Rumeysa Ozturk was taken by ICE and ended up at the South Louisiana ICE Processing Center. Why would ICE ship someone across the country from Massachusetts to Louisiana? You guessed it. The South Louisiana center is owned and operated by none other than Geo Group as one of its 50 private prison locations. Santa Cruz resident Cliona Ward shipped to Tacoma? Geo Group location. Even those scheduled for deportation often wait weeks and even months at ICE detention centers while their paperwork is completed and processed. And each night with a filled bed is extra change in the pocket for groups like CivicGroup and Geo Group. 

This is more than an oligarchy. This is a kleptocracy. It's a government by the rich, for the rich, at the expense of everyone else. But once you see what is happening, you cannot unsee it. Money and power are the only motivators for the Republican Party. They aren't arresting immigrants to make us safer; they're arresting immigrants to fill beds in immigration detention centers that have occupancy requirements with ICE. It's a giant scheme where non-citizens and Green Card holders are targeted because they have the fewest rights in this country. None of what is happening is by chance. This is a systematic process to criminalize immigrants as a gift to the private prison industrial complex. Once you understand all this, you understand how and why the ICE raids are happening like they are. 

And you understand the lengths to which Republicans will go to keep their CivicGroup and Geo Group overlords happy.