County Fight
Operational-Despite-Opposition
Surprise AZ — City Passed 5-Year Ban on Detention Facilities (Unenforceable Due to Federal Preemption)
Maricopa, AZ
Current status: City passed 5-year ban, but federal preemption makes it unenforceable. ICE purchased the warehouse ($70M+) regardless. DHS later scaled back planned capacity.
Surprise, AZ passed a five-year ban on detention facilities after learning DHS had purchased a $70M+ warehouse without notifying the city council. The ban is unenforceable — federal preemption means local democratic processes (city councils, zoning boards, ballot measures) cannot prevent the federal government from using property it owns.
The lesson: You can’t ban the federal government from using a building it already bought. The Kansas City model (pressuring the seller before the sale closes) works; the Surprise model (banning after purchase) doesn’t.
DHS later scaled back the planned capacity of the surprise-az-warehouse, but the facility remains in federal hands.
Sources
This research is published at The RAMM — investigative reporting on the detention pipeline.