Good.
Bexar County Commissioners voted 3-1 Tuesday to formally oppose a proposed immigration detention facility on San Antonio’s East Side, approving a resolution that leaves the door open to join potential legal challenges against the project.
The vote marks the governmental body’s first move to publicly oppose the facility. County officials acknowledged that the vote would not stop the facility from coming to fruition, but emphasized the need to signal opposition to the project.
Department of Homeland Security officials confirmed they purchased a nearly 640,000-square-foot industrial building on the East Side known as Oakmont 410 in early February for use as a detention facility. Internal U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement documents indicate facility near Loop 410 is expected to be operational by November 2026.
The measure passed with support from County Judge Peter Sakai and Commissioners Rebeca Clay-Flores (Pct. 1), Justin Rodriguez (Pct. 2) and Tommy Calvert (Pct. 4). Precinct 4 Commissioner Grant Moody, the sole Republican on the dais, voted against the resolution.
Rodriguez said the resolution was crafted through a collective effort to ensure any potential next steps would fall within the county’s legal authority.
“I don’t know that we can capture all of the emotion and anger and just the consternation we all have about what’s happening in one document with words,” Rodriguez said during discussion of the resolution. “It’s not perfect, but I think it expresses where we are in terms of opposing this ICE facility in our community.”
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Calvert, who represents the area where the facility will be located, said that he has begun consulting with legal groups about possible strategies to push back.
Shortly after the ICE facility was announced, Calvert traveled to Washington, D.C., in late February to speak with attorneys from a number of organizations, including The League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC). The discussion aimed to explore potential legal avenues that could be used to challenge the facility’s development.
On Tuesday, Calvert said he plans to speak with another group of what he called “a very exciting group of lawyers in Washington, D.C.,” who he says “will outline where they think the legal teeth are for Bexar County.”
He added that legal action could move forward even if Bexar County ultimately does not participate directly in a lawsuit.
“Whether or not the Commissioners Court ascribed itself or anchored itself to legal action, I was not going to allow our community, our county, to go unrepresented in the courts where we can find justice,” he said. “We will pursue that with or without the participation of Bexar County. “
The effort coincides with moves being made by the City of San Antonio following a February resolution aimed at exploring ways the city could push back against the proposed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility.
The language of the county’s resolution left open the possibility of working with the city on “legal and policy” options, including partnering with residents, businesses and nonprofits to “ensure the rights of citizens and immigrants are maintained.”
City officials have already begun exploring zoning changes and a potential moratorium aimed at regulating private detention facilities within city limits. The city’s action has drawn criticism from some, including District 10 Councilmember Marc Whyte, who called the actions and resolution “largely symbolic.”
See here for some background. I’m glad to see this, and I hope that many other localities will take similar action, even if there’s little they can do to stop these rancid places from being built, because they don’t have the legal authority to stop it. What they can do, however, is slow it down, throw as much sand in the gears as they can, so that by the time we have a better government, or even just a Congress and maybe a Senate that can take more effective resistant action, these projects are not at a point where they’re closer to being finished than to being started. Even if it just delays the inevitable, every day later that they’re opened is a day they’re not dehumanizing a bunch of innocent people. That matters, a lot.
They can also call attention to every entity involved in these cursed projects – realtors, management groups, construction firms, and of course the property owners – and expose them to as much scrutiny and negative attention as possible. I suspect that most of the actors involved in bringing these monstrosities to life would greatly prefer to do so under cover of darkness. They should not be allowed to do that. You want to make some blood money, we get to name and shame. If that helps delay or even derail some of these projects, so much the better. They can find a use for their money that isn’t a blight on everyone involved.