Immigration detention facility near empty in California

By AMY TAXIN
Associated Press

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A detention center in the wind-swept California desert town of Adelanto could house nearly 2,000 migrants facing the prospect of deportation. These days, it’s nearly empty. The facility is an extreme example of how the U.S. government’s use of guaranteed minimum payments in contracts with private companies to house immigrant detainees can have a potential financial downside. The U.S. government pays to guarantee 30,000 immigration detention beds in four dozen facilities, but so far this fiscal year about half of them on average have been occupied, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement data. In the last two years, immigration detention facilities across the United States have been underutilized as authorities needed to space out detainees due to COVID-19.