The Trump administration will reopen a detention center for immigrant families which was shuttered by former president Joe Biden.
The sprawling facility in South Texas was barred from housing families four years ago as Biden sought to end the detention of children.
But amid Trump’s immigration crackdown, CoreCivic, which ran the facility, revealed on Wednesday it had reached a new agreement with the United States government.
The South Texas Family Residential Center will reopen in Dilley with the capacity to hold 2,400 people.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers will allocate family units it discovers living in the United States illegally to the facility.
Border crossings have reportedly plummeted by a staggering 90 percent since Trump’s inauguration, now recording fewer than 300 illegal crossings per day, according to Border Patrol chief Mike Banks.
Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem celebrated the admistration’s successes on March 3, revealing: ‘In February, there were just 8,326 apprehensions at the U.S. Mexico border. That is lowest number in recorded history.’
But Trump is reportedly disappointed with the number of arrests and deportations and is putting pressure on officials to ramp it up.
CoreCivic spokesman Steve Owen told the Washington Post: ‘it’s our understanding that this will be housing families again. It’s a family residential center.’
In late 2021, Biden determined the facility could no longer hold children as he sought alternatives to custodial detention for youths.
But Trump issued an executive order when he returned to the White House which sought to reverse protections offered to migrant children.
The order rolled back certain protections for migrants which forbade ICE officers from arresting them at specific locations – including schools, churches and hospitals.
More than 600,000 immigrant children have crossed the U.S.-Mexico border without a parent or legal guardian since 2019, according to government data.
Immigration enforcement officers were last month directed to track down and deport migrant children who arrived in the United States without their parents.
It comes amid heightened pressures to reach President Trump’s lofty deportation targets as part of his election commitment to solve America’s immigration crisis.
According to an internal memo seen by Reuters, agents at Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) will now direct their focus to unaccompanied minors.
The memo cited a ‘planning phase’ to begin on January 27, followed by three more phases of implementation, to begin at an unspecified date.
Authorities, as part of the instructions, are to ensure children are not victims of human trafficking or being exploited before deporting them.
According to Trump’s border czar Tom Homan, upwards of 300,000 undocumented children ‘went missing’ during the Biden administration.
He said these children were at risk of trafficking and exploitation. The majority are from Central America and Mexico.