By David Stout
El Paso is a community comprised and shaped by immigrants, rooted in solidarity, and defined by our binational spirit. Every day, people come here to build better lives, and in doing so, they make our community, and our country, stronger.
What happens in El Paso often becomes the blueprint for the nation. That is why we must speak strongly against Trump’s mass incarceration of immigrants and the weaponization of our city for profit and fear.
The federal government is building the largest migrant detention facility in U.S. history, a 5,000-bed facility, right here in El Paso County, on Fort Bliss property. It will be run by private contractors with no experience in immigration or humanitarian care, and it was planned without meaningful consultation with local leaders or the community it will directly impact.
This is not safety. This is cruelty.
Under the Trump administration, apprehensions have become indiscriminate and due process – basic fairness – is often skirted. As of August 2025, over 332,000 individuals have been deported, with projections indicating that the total could exceed 400,000 by year’s end.
To fund this, Trump’s tax cuts for billionaires bill throws an unprecedented $76 billion into the rapid expansion of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and lockups. Behind these numbers lies a deliberate policy that treats people as a political spectacle rather than as human beings deserving fairness and care.
Locking up immigrants in a military facility violates our moral responsibility, undermining the principles of justice, compassion and due process that define our nation.
Immigrant detention is about control. It turns human beings into profit margins for private contractors. No corporation should be making billions of dollars by imprisoning people for seeking a better life. Not only do they do so, but they often actively lobby for harsher laws simply to line their own pockets.
White Christian nationalist leaders, including Trump and his racist billionaire allies, have turned religion into a tool to justify harsh treatment of migrants instead of offering compassion. The same people who preach “love thy neighbor” are turning away those who cross our border seeking safety, replacing the Bible’s call for welcome with a politicized gospel of fear and exclusion.
True faith calls for feeding the hungry, sheltering the stranger and protecting the vulnerable. Twisting religion to do the opposite, taking the beautiful word “sanctuary” and packing it full of lies, turns it into a tool of oppression.
Leaders who claim to defend freedom and faith while spending billions to cage human beings betray both.
The expansion of mass detention is part of a broader authoritarian playbook, where fear of the “other” is used to consolidate power. History shows that mass incarceration of marginalized communities is a hallmark of fascist movements. When governments normalize locking people up based on identity or place of birth, they pave the way for even greater abuses.
Militarizing immigration policy and turning military infrastructure inward to control civilians, and we already are seeing that play out in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., is a dangerous step toward authoritarianism.
We, the people, deserve full transparency, oversight, and accountability. If members of Congress cannot see conditions, that is not national security. It is a cover-up.
The federal government has already awarded $1.26 billion to a private contractor with no experience in detention or humanitarian care. That is a recipe for disaster, abuse and corruption.
The administration that claims to be a fiscal watchdog is on a spending binge, with outrageous bonuses to recruit for ICE – which, as reported by the New York Times, has radically increased detainment of immigrants with no criminal record.
The criminalization of migration is a political choice, not a necessity. Led by servant leaders doing the work on the ground, we have supported compassion, community and justice over fear and profit. We can and must build an effective and compassionate immigration system that centers humanity, due process and opportunity — not cages, contracts and cruelty.
If El Paso accepts this facility without resistance, authoritarian leaders will replicate it across the country. Fascism thrives when fear is weaponized, faith is politicized and dissent is silenced.
This fight is not just about immigrants. It is about defending democracy itself from leaders who erode our freedoms under the guise of law, order and religion.
Immigrants are not a threat to our community. They are our neighbors, our co-workers, our friends, and our family. We will not let fear, racism, white supremacy or the politicization of religion dictate how America treats human beings. Not here. Not now.
Not ever.
David Stout is the El Paso County commissioner for Precinct 2.
The post Opinion: El Paso must resist Trump’s plan for the largest migrant detention center in U.S. history appeared first on El Paso Matters.
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