Protesters rally against planned Maryland immigration detention facility that's now paused

Source: AP

By REBECCA SANTANA and HEATHER HOLLINGSWORTH
Updated 9:26 AM CDT, April 9, 2026
Leer en español

HAGERSTOWN, Md. (AP) — Horns blared and protesters screamed “Stop ICE!” outside a meeting on the western edge of Maryland where county officials were discussing mundane issues like the solid waste budget.

It’s been like this ever since the Department of Homeland Security bought an 825,000-square-foot (76,645-square-meter) building in Washington County as part of a plan to transform warehouses across the U.S. into detention facilities for tens of thousands of immigrants.

“This is a facility built for packages, not people,” Patrick Dattilio, the founder of an anti- Immigration and Customs Enforcement group called Hagerstown Rapid Response, said as he stood outside the county commission meeting.

The federal government has faced fierce opposition in communities where it spent a total of $1.074 billion for 11 warehouses under a plan that Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin is reviewing. Washington County is the most welcoming community — a place where officials said they supported ICE, albeit amid whistles and jeers. The processing center there was supposed to be one of the first to open in a facilities project hatched under Mullin’s predecessor, Kristi Noem.



Read more: https://apnews.com/article/ice-warehouse-detention-nome-mullin-465f29bf754b365fda75b723b0dd0322