New Jersey and Roxbury Township Sue Trump Admin Over Incoming Immigration Detention Facility

The state of New Jersey and Roxbury Township filed a lawsuit on March 20 to block the Trump administration from building a mass detention facility in the area.

“The safety and well-being of New Jerseyans will always be my top priority, and the Trump Administration’s plans for a detention facility in Roxbury will not make our residents safer,” Gov. Mikie Sherrill stated in a March 20 press release.

The lawsuit, filed against the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), flagged a series of alleged issues that would complicate the Trump administration’s plans to transform the Roxbury Warehouse into a large-scale immigration detention center, located approximately 40 miles west of New York City.

“The Roxbury Warehouse is a logistics center fit for Amazon Prime packages, not people—among other things, it currently has a total of four toilets, despite the planned influx of up to 1,500 detainees and hundreds more ICE employees,” the filing states.

The DHS planned to begin renovations at the end of March and complete them within 90 days, court documents revealed.

New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenport accused the DHS and ICE of “ramming through a secretive purchase and rushed renovation,” saying it is not complying with the Administrative Procedure Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, the Intergovernmental Cooperation Act, and the Immigration and Nationality Act.

The lawsuit suggested that potential health issues at the facility would also overwhelm emergency medical services, overburden local resources, and create hazardous traffic conditions.

“The most basic requirement of the [Administrative Procedure Act] avoids arbitrary and capricious decision-making by ensuring that agencies consider all of the important aspects of the problem before them,” the filing reads.

“Here, DHS failed to consider the most obvious ones: whether the Roxbury Warehouse is in fact an appropriate site for a detention facility considering the overburdening of local infrastructure, strain on local resources, substantial environmental harms, threats to public health and safety, and unsuitability for human habitation.”

An ICE spokesperson defended the Trump administration’s decision to place a detention center in the area.

“Prior to purchasing this site, ICE carefully evaluated the use of existing facilities to help minimize environmental impacts, including potential impacts to protected species, sensitive natural resources, and valued cultural resources,” an ICE spokesperson told the Epoch Times in a statement on March 20.

The spokesperson criticized the lawsuit, saying it “isn’t about the environment.”

“It’s about trying to stop President Trump from making America safe again,” the spokesperson said.