‘Refuse complicity’: Surprise residents demand city council oppose massive ICE detention center

In the middle of the sprawling suburb of Surprise, Arizona, less than a mile from a bustling strip mall and down the road from Legacy Middle School, sits the 418,400 square-foot warehouse where Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) intends to hold approximately 1,500 detained migrants as part of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.

Located on Sweetwater Avenue and Dysart Road, the facility was quietly purchased by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for over $70 million on Jan. 23, sold by New York-based real estate LLC Rockefeller Group. 

While many Surprise residents were unaware of these developments until a recent DHS press release, they made quick work of making sure their voices were heard at the weekly Call to the Public portion of Tuesday’s Surprise City Council meeting. Nearly 1,000 people showed up to either deliver testimonies, ask questions and present concerns, imploring council members to stop ICE actions by any means necessary. 

“There's got to be a loophole, there's got to be a zoning ordinance, there's got to be a contract that can be withheld. There's got to be something that can be done to stop this from happening in this community,” Blanche Brandon, one of the many Surprise residents that spoke during nearly five hours of public comments, said. 

Judy R., who has family members who died in the Holocaust, said she was there to prevent similar atrocities. “I'm here. I go to any place that will protest the administration, their cabinet, their lawlessness and their funding of this out of control militia,” said the retired public school teacher, sign language interpreter and local community advocate, from her place outside of Surprise City Hall alongside the crowd of protestors, many of whom were waiting to be called on for comment inside the already packed chambers. 

In a statement released before the meeting, the Surprise City Council said DHS had not contacted local officials about the purchase and therefore members had no idea it had transpired. Due to the supremacy clause in the U.S Constitution, federal projects — such as this proposed detention center in Surprise — are not subject to local regulations, including zoning laws, the statement reads.

“While we do not participate in ICE operations, we also cannot interrupt or prevent their operations,” the statement read. 

“We understand that this Council cannot overrule ICE’s federal authority. We're not asking you to do what you legally cannot do, but what you can do — and what you must do — is refuse silence, refuse complicity and refuse to look away,” Cynthia Fox, a longtime Surprise resident, said during her time at the podium. “This is not just another development project. This is not a warehouse. This is not housing. This is a place where human beings will be confined.”

“We've all seen the reports coming out of Florida; people held in overcrowded, degrading conditions, people denied basic medical care, including the current outbreak of measles, families torn apart, arrests carried out with brutality that shocks the conscience. These are not abstract policy debates. These are real, human experiences, and they're happening right now. And now our community is being asked, without warning, without consent, to host the next chapter of that story,” Fox added.

Resident concerns regarding the detention center come amid a record high of 70,000 ICE detainees in the deportation agency’s 23-year history, according to DHS data obtained by CBS News — with more than 6,000 arrests recorded by ICE in Arizona alone last year, per a CALÓ News analysis. With an approved budget of $170.7 billion and an additional $45 billion expansion of detention facilities, federal officials are reported to be scouting more facilities to hold the increasing number of detainees being abducted by masked ICE agents nationwide.

Against the backdrop of a reported 32 deaths of people in ICE custody last year and the recent public killings of Keith Porter Jr., Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti by federal agents, these incidents have sparked a national uproar and a larger conversation about ICE’s violent tactics, especially behind closed doors. 

“If ICE can murder people on camera — imagine what they do in private,” one of the signs held by a protester at the steps of Surprise City Hall read as many listened in on the meeting being broadcast from people’s phones and amplified by bullhorns held by others. Several grassroots organizations were also in attendance, such as Indivisible, Puente Movement for Migrant Justice, Organize Power in Numbers (OPIN) and the Party of Socialism and Liberation (PSL) in Phoenix.

“These proposed facilities cannot be allowed to operate in our community. The drain on our resources, the additional congestion on our streets, the negative press about our town. I mean, do you want to buy a house next door to Alligator Alcatraz right now? Nobody will want to live in Surprise. Those are selfish reasons for Surprise residents to oppose these facilities, but they are valid,” Rosalynn Melling, a suburban mom, active Surprise community member and volunteer, said as she spoke before the council, raising additional concerns regarding the close proximity the detention facility would have to a proposed AI data center, Project Baccara. “Laws are being broken, human rights trampled and people are getting hurt and killed in these places we cannot live next door to… These proposed facilities are within two miles of each other. Slow them down before there is irreversible damage done here.”

There are currently 261 known ICE detention facilities operating in the United States — 66 privately operated and 194 county or city-run facilities — according to the Freedom for Immigrants’ interactive Detention Map. While DHS claims to be building these facilities to hold “the worst of the worst,” 74% of all detainees currently in custody have no criminal record, according to data from Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC). 

Many of the migrants held in these facilities face inhumane conditions. ICE detention centers have a record of reported abuse and human rights violations, such as medical neglect and exposure, punitive solitary confinement, lack of due process, obstructed access to legal counsel and discriminatory, racist treatment within. Despite calls for reform that were initiated prior to the current administration, the federal government has continued to fund ICE with little to no guardrails or oversight.

DHS has yet to release a timeline for ICE operations to begin at the Surprise warehouse.

“There must be a line. There must be a point where we say this violates our shared humanity. Human dignity is not partisan, decency is not radical and morality does not stop at jurisdictional boundaries. If our city becomes home to a facility like this, then our city's name becomes attached to what happens inside it,” Fox said. “We cannot say it's not our responsibility. You may not control ICE, but you do control whether this city stands up and says, ‘not without scrutiny, not without accountability and not without our voices heard.’”  

Following an evening of heavy testimonies and tearful pleas, Surprise Mayor Kevin Sartor ended the meeting by thanking everyone for showing up and sharing their concerns and stories with them, stating that they members of the city council have a lot to consider.

Analisa Valdez (she/her) is a freelance journalist based in Phoenix. Her reporting includes community & culture, social justice, arts, business, and politics.