Dozens of faith leaders and community members gather in Appleton, MN Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2025 to protest the likely re-opening of the Prairie Correctional Facility as a 1,600-bed ICE detention center. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)
APPLETON, Minn. (Minnesota Reformer) — Immigration and Customs Enforcement will pay private prison company CoreCivic more than half a billion dollars to reopen a defunct 1,600-bed prison in rural western Minnesota as an immigrant detention center.
CoreCivic said in a press release the company expects to begin receiving detainees in the fourth quarter of 2026, and that it expects to generate approximately $75 million in revenue per year for its role in facilitating the mass deportation agenda of President Donald Trump.
A notice posted on the federal government’s award management website lists the total contract value: More than $536 million over the next five years.
The detention center will be the first of its kind in Minnesota, which until now has housed immigrant detainees in local jails or shipped them to facilities out of state, most often to Camp East Montana in El Paso, Texas. ICE also holds immigrants for short periods in the cells at the Whipple Federal Building, home to the agency’s regional headquarters.
The acquisition of the 1,600-bed prison, known as the Prairie Correctional Facility, is part of the agency’s push to expand detention capacity to historic highs since Trump began his second term. In July, the average daily population of immigrant detainees in ICE and Border Patrol custody surpassed 65,600, up from 39,000 when Trump took office, according to agency data.
The former prison in Appleton has been on ICE’s radar for at least a year. The Washington Post first reported ICE was considering reopening the facility on Aug. 15, 2025, sparking protests from immigrant rights activists and a handful of residents of the 1,400-person city.
CoreCivic runs some of the country’s largest and most infamous immigrant detention centers, including the Dilley Immigration Processing Center in Texas, which holds families with children, including, at one time, little Liam Conejo Ramos. (The image of him in his floppy-eared hat and Spiderman backpack outside a federal vehicle became synonymous with the immigration crackdown here.) Disease outbreaks, lack of medical care, inedible food and lack of outside time are common complaints of detainees.
Appleton is about a three-hour drive from the Twin Cities, near the border with South Dakota.
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