Report: Minnesota prison could become ICE detention facility

The Prairie Correctional Facility is Appleton, Minn., could become a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center.

That’s according to new reporting from the Washington Post outlining the agency’s plans to double the amount of people in detention.

The Prairie Correctional Facility has a capacity of 1,600 people, which would make it one of the nation’s largest immigration detention facilities.

Minnesota’s only private prison, it was shuttered in 2010 but has been a subject of debate for years. In 2023, the Minnesota House passed a bill that would ban private prisons in the state. That bill did not make it through the Senate.

ICE confirmed planning documents obtained by the newspaper were real, but said they were not final plans, said Washington Post reporter Douglas MacMillan.

Many local governments told the Post they did not have contracts with ICE — but that doesn’t mean new facilities couldn’t quickly develop.

“In some cases, it seems like this road map is aspirational,” MacMillan told MPR News. “What we have seen in the past six months is that this agency, under Trump, is willing to move into an area very quickly and try to fill it with migrants in a matter of weeks or months.”

Appleton city administrator John Olinger told MPR News the city is not in communication with ICE and does not have a contract, but that Prairie Correctional owner CoreCivic is “aggressively pursuing” a contract with ICE.

In a statement, CoreCivic said of the Appleton facility, “We continue to explore opportunities with our government partners for which this site could be a viable solution.”

Press play above to listen to MacMillan’s full conversation with MPR New host Catharine Richert.