A Louisiana community rises up against a new ICE center to detain and deport families

On Thursday, the lobby of a building on the England Airpark Authority’s grounds filled with residents of Alexandria and New Orleans who had come to tell the airport’s board of directors: “We don’t want ICE.” One by one they signed up to speak at the meeting. From the doorway, a few meters away and in plain view, was the structure where U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) plans to set up in the coming months what it has described as “a transit facility” to deport minors and families who have already agreed to leave voluntarily. Residents fear it will operate like any other detention center.

“If these migrants have already chosen voluntary deportation, they don’t need to be confined. Why do you want to lock them up if they say they want to go home? Put them on a plane,” says Diana Mobley, 64, in an interview with EL PAÍS. She attended with her 34-year-old daughter, Erin Tracy. Both have tried to protest ICE’s presence in their community at England Airpark Authority meetings, and over the January deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti after agents shot them while opposing raids in Minnesota.

Shortly afterward, the room where the airport board would meet was full. In the chairs sat members of the community; on the dais were seven commissioners and, later, the board of directors, including CEO Ralph Hennessy.

When secretary Steven Mansour gave the first person the right to speak, complaints directed at the commissioners began. They condemned the center ICE is about to open, but also objected to the commissioners’ putting on the agenda an amendment to an ordinance that could limit their right to protest on airport property and allowing it only with a permit.

“This is a democracy”

Diana Mobley has tried to protest at the airport several times with members of her community. They have not always been allowed. After the deaths of Good and Pretti, they were removed from the facility and had to continue the demonstration elsewhere in Alexandria. Her daughter says on another occasion they chose to go to a different location out of fear, “because of course we don’t want anyone to be arrested.”

Mobley believes that if the commissioners approve the ordinance, protesting will become even harder, but she insists they will not stop: “We have the right to say we don’t want that detention center and we don’t want harm done to any human being.”

These protests they speak of are, they say, what sparked debate over the ordinance amendment during the England Airpark Authority commissioners’ meeting. But like them, those who spoke said they will continue protesting.

“We have the right to ask questions, to organize and to demand accountability. If this board believes it is making the right decision, it must allow scrutiny,” one person said when taking the floor. “Reconsider your decision to move forward with that detention center,” they added. When the topic was raised, the commissioners’ secretary interrupted to ask that remarks be limited to the ordinance.

“It’s important that those in this room remember this is a democracy and that any authority is a public servant and is subject to accountability,” said an activist from Louisiana. “It’s troubling that they are trying to limit the right to free expression and public protest.”

“If you think this is annoying and irritating […] I guarantee there will be a lot more,” another activist said into the microphone, suggesting they help stop the decision to open an ICE facility for minors and families. “Turn it into something that can help the women and children of Alexandria. That center will not help anyone.”

Mobley’s voice cracks as she tells this newspaper about members of her community who have lost contact with relatives after they were detained by ICE. She also recalls all the migrants she has seen disembark from planes in handcuffs at Alexandria International Airport, the country’s largest transfer hub for migrants who will be deported.

When EL PAÍS asked whether hearing the community’s concerns made him doubt whether to allow ICE to open the center, airport CEO Ralph Hennessy replied: “I have no doubts, I don’t.” “There is a policy from our federal government and these companies are operating within guidelines set under contracts with the federal government. What we are doing is granting them a building to operate in,” he added.

According to the AP, one of the first outlets to report on the opening of this center, the facility’s operation would be managed by LaSalle Family Foundation, an affiliate of LaSalle Corrections, one of the main private prison and ICE detention management companies in several U.S. cities. The company’s chief financial officer, Tim Kurpiewski, confirmed the information to AP.

So far in 2026, two migrants have died in ICE detention facilities managed by LaSalle Corrections in Louisiana.

By April 2026, more than 60,000 people were held in facilities managed by ICE, and Louisiana ranked as the second state with the highest number of detainees in agency centers — after Texas — according to estimates from the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC), a nonpartisan research and data analysis organization.

The building

Hennessy explained that the center they expect to open in Alexandria does not yet hold migrants. It will operate inside a barracks being renovated on a former military base and will be supported by habitable trailers to house additional people. On Wednesday workers were seen renovating and painting the exterior. Around the site, furniture and sofas were piled outdoors. Inside one of the rooms in the three-story building, old and new air conditioners sit on the floor.

Hennessy said renovation work has been delayed: “It will begin operating within 60 days.”

In a letter handed to the commissioners by one of the activists, about 10 organizations — including the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the National Immigration Project — warned that the structure contains asbestos and is located where dangerous chemicals that persist in the environment for years are concentrated.

Hennessy said the aviation authority received the building after it had been cleaned by the military. He said no one has shown him evidence of chemicals that could harm children and migrant families: “Our documentation does not say that. If other people have information, facts, present them to us. So far, there is nothing to support that claim.”

Outside the building, Mobley prepares to leave for the day. She hopes city authorities heard the community’s demands: “If they open that center, they will leave a stain on this community, they will leave a stain on that board. And then they will tell us we cannot protest.”

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