By Colin Brennan
BUFFALO — Rep. Tim Kennedy has given the Department of Homeland Security until Nov. 2 to answer a new round of questions about a roughly $16.7 million expansion of the federal immigration detention center in Batavia. The Trump administration says the project is needed because New York no longer lets county jails hold ICE detainees.
The Buffalo Democrat, who sits on the House Committee on Homeland Security, made an unannounced oversight visit to the Buffalo Service Processing Center in Batavia on Oct. 15, his office said. In an Oct. 20 follow-up letter to DHS, he asked about construction, medical staffing and lawyers’ access at the Genesee County facility, which is the largest Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in the state.
“Conducting oversight of federal agencies is one of my fundamental responsibilities in Congress, and I will not allow a nearly $17 million expansion of a federal detention facility to move forward without demanding answers,” Kennedy said in an Oct. 21 statement.
The administration has been just as direct about its reasons. In a Sept. 29 letter to Kennedy, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin wrote: “The American people voted overwhelmingly in 2024 for mass deportations, and that is what this Department, under my leadership, is going to deliver, in part due to increased ICE detention capacity.”
What DHS has disclosed
Kennedy’s office released Mullin’s letter and its attachments in early October. They are the most detailed public account so far of the project.
According to DHS, there were 653 detainees at Batavia as of July 8. Twenty-eight percent had criminal records. The department said every detainee is held for violating U.S. immigration law and that ICE does not house anyone on pending criminal charges, since those people go to the U.S. Marshals Service.
DHS also argued that criminal history is the wrong test. “Known criminal history is not a prerequisite for immigration enforcement action and never has been,” the department’s response says. “The American people support the removal of illegal aliens, not just those with known criminal records, to say nothing of the untold number of illegal aliens who commit crimes every day, such as identity theft and fraud, for which they are never arrested or charged.”
The attachments include a June 15 internal ICE memo seeking approval for a “soft sided temporary detention facility adjacent to the Batavia Service Processing Center.” It was sent by Ralph Ferguson, an assistant director in ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations, to Deputy Director Charles Wall. The memo puts the two-year cost at $16,703,366.80, including $5 million for contingencies. It lists the contract as sole-source to Akima Global Services and names the funding source as the One Big Beautiful Bill, the tax and spending law President Trump signed last year.
The memo says the vendor would build, guard, maintain and eventually take down the temporary structure. “While this approach may be more expensive, it is necessary to meet the immediate and urgent bedspace requirements in the Buffalo area of responsibility,” it says.
DHS told Kennedy the new beds would house women, which Batavia has not done before, because state law now bars county jails from contracting with ICE. Men could be housed there if needed, the department said, but children would not. WXXI News reported that the main facility has 650 beds and typically runs well over that number.
The state law behind the project
ICE has tied the expansion directly to Albany. “Due to New York State laws prohibiting counties from contracting with ICE to house illegal aliens, ICE is constructing a new hard-sided detention facility on federal property at the Buffalo Federal Detention Facility in Batavia, New York, to ensure sufficient detention capacity in support of the agency’s immigration enforcement mission,” the agency said in a statement reported by Spectrum News.
That law, the Local Cops, Local Crimes Act, took effect Aug. 25 and also ended local 287(g) agreements, which let trained local officers carry out some immigration enforcement duties under ICE supervision. Fifteen county sheriffs sued to overturn it.
At a Sept. 25 roundtable in Oswego County hosted by Rep. Claudia Tenney, R-Cleveland, the sheriffs said the fight is about local control. “We don’t answer to the governor. We answer to our local constituents,” Oswego County Sheriff Don Hilton said, according to WRVO. Tenney said she would keep backing their challenge.
Gov. Kathy Hochul‘s office has defended the law. “Anyone who claims that the Local Cops Local Crimes Act prevents police from working with ICE and other federal law enforcement to apprehend or detain dangerous criminals either does not understand the law or is lying,” a Hochul spokesperson told WRVO.
Kennedy’s objections
Kennedy reads the same numbers very differently. When he released the DHS response on Oct. 2, he focused on the 28 percent figure.
“This administration told the American people it was going after the worst of the worst. Now they’ve admitted in writing that it isn’t true. More than 70% of the people held in Batavia have no criminal record, and DHS says that doesn’t matter,” Kennedy said in a statement reported by Spectrum News. He also called the spending part of a “cruel and inhumane agenda” and said the government should focus on costs for families.
His Oct. 20 letter raises more specific questions. It says construction of the 100-bed facility began Oct. 5 and that federal records call the structure both “hard-sided” and “soft-sided.” It asks how DHS will provide medical care, citing a 2024 DHS Inspector General finding that Batavia had no permanent physician. It also asks about the Oct. 13 detention of German Machado Guillen and about parking limits that Kennedy says make it harder for legal staff to reach clients.
Kennedy’s office says members of Congress have a right to make unannounced inspections under Section 527 of the fiscal 2024 DHS appropriations law, a right it says was upheld in the federal case Neguse et al. v. U.S. ICE et al.
“I will continue pressing for transparency and accountability to ensure taxpayer dollars are being spent responsibly and the basic needs of those in federal custody are being met,” Kennedy said.
Contracts already flowing
Separate from the Akima contract, federal spending records show money already moving to Batavia. The Rochester Beacon reported that USAspending.gov lists four DHS contracts worth about $3 million in total. The largest is more than $2.5 million to TLI Construction for LED lighting and occupancy sensors. The others are $125,373 to Stark Tech for an energy-tracking system, $53,175 to New York State Fence Co. of Hilton for an emergency perimeter fence and $10,000 to Rapid Deployment Inc.
The number of people held at Batavia reached 737 in April, the Beacon reported.
The politics
Kennedy faces Republican and Conservative nominee Dennis Hannon on Nov. 3 in the 26th District, which covers Buffalo, most of Erie County and part of Niagara County. Kennedy voted against the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which funded expanded detention.
Hannon backs tougher enforcement with a focus on dangerous offenders. “I will strengthen cooperation between local and federal agencies, enforce immigration and worksite laws with a focus on serious public safety threats, and crack down on fentanyl trafficking,” he said in a Ballotpedia candidate survey. His campaign website also promises to “strengthen worksite compliance and lawful hiring.”
The Buffalo Chronicle is seeking comment from Kennedy’s office, DHS and the Hannon campaign. DHS asked Kennedy to direct further questions to its Office of Legislative Affairs. Kennedy wants answers by Nov. 2, the day before the election.
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