U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is considering ways to expand capacity at immigrant detention facilities to accommodate 125,000 people, as well as buying up existing privately owned facilities, according to four sources with knowledge of or involved in planning. Buying rather than leasing detention facilities will give ICE greater control over operations that would otherwise fall under state and local governments’ purview, sources said.

As the Trump administration pushes further toward the White House’s mass deportation effort, the federal agency is looking at ways to add space to its existing network of detention sites and gain greater control of those sites.

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