State: ICE's Claims For Detention Center ‘Border On Absurd,' Court Should Block Construction

By Steve Crane, Maryland Matters

April 10, 2026

A federal judge needs to extend his order blocking work on an immigration detention center in Washington County, because a federal government promise to pause work could “lift at any moment, in secret and without warning,” the state argued Thursday.

That was part of a filing with U.S. District Judge Brendan Hurson in the latest turn in Maryland’s lawsuit seeking to block Department of Homeland Security plans to convert an 825,000-square-foot warehouse near Williamsport into a detention center for up to 1,500 immigrants.

Hurson last month issued a two-week order halting construction on the site while the state’s lawsuit progressed. He then extended it through April 17, to give both sides a chance to argue whether he should impose a more permanent injunction. In the meantime, he ordered Immigration and Customs Enforcement to stop “proceeding with renovation and/or construction activities required to build, retrofit, or otherwise convert the Williamsport Warehouse … into an immigration detention facility.”

The state argues that ICE’s purchase of the warehouse in January, for $102 million, was essentially done in secret and that every review and procedural step since has been done quietly, with little to no public input. ICE has not held public hearings and has not met with local officials on the project.

More importantly, the state argues that ICE has failed to conduct proper environmental or historical review of the project. Construction could threaten water quality of nearby waterways, which are home to several species that have been designated endangered by the state.

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It says the water and sewer systems for Williamsport, a town of about 2,000 people, would be overwhelmed by the demands of 1,500 detainees in the warehouse. Area roads would also likely need to be improved to accommodate extra traffic to the site, the state argues.

Maryland then asked for the order to stop construction while the suit was pending. The state noted that ICE has moved with “unrelenting speed” to convert the 825,000-square-foot warehouse: ICE last month awarded a $113 million contract to KVG LLC of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, “to immediately retrofit the warehouse into this massive immigration detention facility,” the state said in its petition.

Hurson noted that the KVG contract was awarded the day after the public comment period closed on the floodzone, and it had a start date of March 6: “Presumably, then, the renovation has already begun.”

In its filing last week, DHS said the only work done so far has been planning, although security an repair work needs to be done.

ICE argued that the state has overblown both the scope of the project and potential harm. Although the Williamsport warehouse could ultimately house 1,500, it said, initial plans only call for 542 people to be detained at the facility, and it has done all the environmental and technical work necessary for a facility of that size, the immigration agency said.

The state failed to meet its burden of demonstrating that work at the facility would “result in irreparable harm to its interests,” the agency said. Traffic to a detention center would be no worse, and probably less than, traffic to an active warehouse, ICE said. Any work needed for the first phase of project, with 542 detainees, would occur within the confines of the warehouse itself — roof and HVAC repairs, for example — or on the existing footprint of the site, for such things as installation of security fencing and security cameras.

If and when the facility expands to accommodate 1,500 detainees, then it will perform the more in-depth reviews required under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), the agency said in its filing. Until then, DHS said it has met all the NEPA requirements needed for the project as currently envisioned: For 542 detainees, including “448 typical dormitory pods, 32 disability accessible dormitory pods, and 62 pods designated for behavioral and special housing needs.”

The state Thursday dismissed ICE’s claim that review for 542 detainees was sufficient. ICE referred repeatedly in its filing to the prospect of 1,500 detainees at the site, the state said, and it needs to study that scenario before launching the site. It also argued that ICE’s attempt to downplay the scope of the project would not work.

“Defendants’ assertion that detaining hundreds of individuals will not change the 'functional use' of a shipping warehouse borders on the absurd,” the state wrote in its filing. “Regardless of what DHS officials might think, a logistics warehouse does not have the same ‘functional use’ as a detention facility for human beings. Rather, the project presents major changes to the property’s ‘functional use,’ which will have significant impacts on public health, local infrastructure, and the environment.”

The state said ICE was presenting Hurson with a “moving target” of detainees, only to excuse its previous shortcomings in the review. And an extended order is needed, the state argued, because ICE has shown little regard for regulatory requirements so far, and that’s not likely to change.

“Absent a preliminary injunction, significant construction and retrofitting efforts at the Williamsport Warehouse could begin at any moment, without any warning to the State or this Court,” the state argued Thursday. “And such construction and subsequent operation implicates all of the irreparable harms previously demonstrated by the State.”

In his initial order, Hurson said an emergency injunction was merited because the state appeared likely to prevail on its claims that ICE failed to meet NEPA, and that the federal government did “not appear to have taken a ‘hard look’ at the potential environmental consequences of their plans for the Williamsport Warehouse.”

Hurson is scheduled to issue a ruling no later than April 16.

Maryland Matters is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501(c)(3) public charity. Maryland Matters maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Steve Crane for questions: scrane@marylandmatters.org. Follow Maryland Matters on Facebook and Twitter.