Editor’s note: Some images in this story contain language that may be offensive. 

Roughly one thousand protesters gathered outside Romulus City Hall this week to voice opposition towards plans for a new Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center. Among the crowd were concerned residents, public officials, faith leaders, and Michiganders from across the state. 

Melody Karr was one of the many protestors picketing the building. She said she lives just an hour away from the detention facility that opened last year in Baldwin and has been to multiple demonstrations protesting it’s opening.

“We don’t need any more concentration camps in Michigan. Anybody that’s paying attention can see that we’re not concentrating on the worst of the worst, that they’re running rampant over our constitutional rights,” said Karr.

City officials say they oppose the detention center

The demonstration preceded the weekly City Council meeting, where a resolution opposing any detention center within city limits was unanimously passed. 

Following the vote, Romulus Mayor Robert McCraight said he and the city are doing everything they can to stop the development of an ICE detention facility. Citing his letter of opposition sent the previous week to ICE Director Todd Lyons and Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, McCraight said a detention center would conflict with current zoning regulations and be too close to residential homes less than a quarter mile away.

McCraight said that, despite not hearing from any officials on the federal level since news broke, he would do what he could to prevent the plans from moving forward.

“While I’m sitting in this position as mayor, we will not issue a permit or certificate of occupancy for this structure unless we’re mandated by a federal judge,” said McCraight.

As the mayor spoke, demonstrators could be heard chanting outside the building. Only 49 of the protestors outside were let into the meeting due to safety codes set by the fire marshal. Those in attendance reiterated their opposition during public comment.

Residents urge more action

Dan Doyle lives less than a mile from the proposed detention center. He urged the city to do more to stop the plans.

“I’m requesting immediate action. Cut the utilities, condemn the building, demo it, take it under eminent domain, whatever you can do. Make it impossible for them to use our neighborhood for these concentration camps,” said Doyle. “This will not be solved by a harshly worded letter or a resolution. We need action.”

Outside in the bitter cold, protestors continued their picket at city hall. Darrin Camilleri, who represents Romulus as a member of the Michigan Senate, was one of many public officials who came to support demonstrators. So far, Camilleri has been one of the only state legislators to reach out to Romulus officials after the plans for a detention center went public. He said he has been working with the city to uncover details about the building purchased by ICE.

“We know that an auto supplier, they put a bid in to buy this building, but ICE came in and outbid the auto supplier. So the Trump administration is literally taking away American jobs from our community that would love an opportunity like that,” said Camilleri. “Now we’re getting stuck with a detention center that no one wants, and it’s down the street from where people live. It’s down the street from where kids go to school.”

The building, located at 7525 Cogswell Street, was previously owned by the real estate investment firm Crestlight Capital. John Coury, managing partner at the firm, said he can’t disclose the selling price or the specific agency the building was sold to due to a signed non-disclosure agreement, according to reporting from Crain’s Detroit Business.

Pattern of quiet-buying

Secrecy surrounding these purchases aren’t unique to Romulus, either. In Social Circle, Georgia, officials were blindsided when they heard of plans to convert a warehouse in the city into a detention center. The previous owner of the warehouse, a commercial real estate firm called PNK Group, said they signed an NDA and couldn’t disclose any information to the city or residents. One month later, a deed for the warehouse was obtained that showed the federal government paid over $100 million more than the most recently assessed price.

When asked by WDET if the Romulus warehouse was purchased for an inflated price compared to the 2025 assessed value of $6,988,500, Crestlight Capital did not respond for comment.

At the time of writing, the city of Romulus has not received any documents indicating how much the property was purchased for.

Southfield ICE offices

Earlier this month, the city released a statement saying offices in Southfield’s One Towne Square were to be leased by the US General Services Administration (GSA) to “support administrative and legal functions associated with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.” 

The statement aligns with reporting from last year that showed the GSA was working with ICE to acquire offices across the country to expand it’s operations

Statements from REDICO, the landlord of the office space, said the lease was with the GSA, not ICE, and “the lease explicitly prohibits any law enforcement, detention or similar activities to take place on the premises.” REDICO’s statement prompted the city to remove their statement on the purchase from its website.

When asked about the city’s removed statement, Southfield Mayor Kenson Siver said he has only heard from REDICO, not GSA or ICE, and the city doesn’t have authority to intervene in tenant/landlord issues as long as they are compliant with zoning laws.

Still, residents and lawmakers are on edge amid the confusion. During the Southfield City Council meeting that took place the same time as the Romulus demonstration, residents packed the building to speak out against any potential presence of ICE in the city.

Southfield resident Lauren Fink said the city still needs to do more to address the offices potentially used in association with ICE.

“I’ve seen statements intended to calm our anxieties about this office opening here in our own community, telling us that this office cannot house armed and uniformed agents,” said Fink. “There seems to be this idea that the work being done by people in offices like this is acceptable, but the work being done by the people they enable is not. That kind of attitude is what allows the horrors of an authoritarian regime to continue.”

Southfield City Council unanimously passed a resolution “affirming community safety, civil rights, and local policy” during the meeting. The resolution does not mention the lease with GSA or the planned office.

A call for community action

Following the possible expansion of ICE in the metro Detroit area, Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib released a statement condemning the encroachment and urging more collective action from the community.

“Across the country, people are coming together and fighting to prevent this massive expansion of ICE’s network of abuse and cruelty. We must organize and use every tool at our disposal to keep ICE out of our neighborhoods,” said Tlaib.

The Southfield office and planned detention center in Romulus come as the Trump administration massively increases the budget for ICE and plans on spending $38.3 billion to turn warehouses across the country into detention centers. Both actions have been made possible through last year’s passing of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which has allocated billions of federal funds for the Trump administration’s mass deportation agenda.

About a thousand protesters showed up to city hall in Romulus to protest a planned Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in the city. 

Lieutenant Governor Garlin Gilchrist, who is hoping to win the Democratic nomination for Secretary of State was also there. “I make sure that people have the power to vote against those who would want to sign off on a budget that would approve these kind of expenditures… that would approve this kind of ICE personnel deployment,” said Gilchrist. “That is unacceptable, and we need ICE out of Michigan.” 

Romulus City Council voted unanimously to condemn the proposed detention center, but admitted they still have not received formal confirmation of the building’s sale to the federal government.

-Reporting by Russ McNamara 

Additional headlines for Tuesday, Feb. 24, 2026

Whitmer will use State of the State to talk affordable housing

Governor Gretchen Whitmer will use her State of the State address Wednesday to call for more programs to address a shortage of affordable housing in Michigan.

Her plans include an affordable housing tax credit to spur development, cuts to regulations and faster approval of building permits. The governor has expressed concerns that President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs will add thousands of dollars to the costs of home-building materials. The governor delivers her State of the State address the evening following the president’s State of the Union address tonight. (MPRN) 

New office of Community Safety

Detroit Mayor Mary Sheffield has established a new office of Neighborhood and Community Safety. Its goal is to help prevent domestic violence and promote conflict resolution.

Teferi Brent will lead the office. He says domestic abuse is a major source of violence that the city needs to address. Brent says that effort would further lower the number of homicides, which hit a 60-year low in 2025. 

-Reporting by Pat Batcheller

Detroit Historical Society celebrates Women’s History Month

The Detroit Historical Society is kicking off Women’s History Month with ‘Love and Flowers: A tribute to Detroit’s Black Matriarchs’ Sunday. 

 The event is a celebration of caregivers past and present and an opportunity to reflect on the question of what it looks like to honor the Black women who “built… nurtured and fought for a better Detroit.”

Registration is through the Black Bottom Archives as a part of its Bottom Up series of community programs exploring memory, storytelling and Black Detroit’s living history.

A museum membership is required for admission, but the Detroit Historical Museum offers a free membership to Detroiters and individual memberships starting at $60 on its website.

Literacy fundraiser

The Flint Unity Farming Project is having a popcorn fundraiser to support is literacy and learning programs.

Listen to the latest episode of the “Detroit Evening Report” on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, NPR.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

A Dearborn father, Abdelouahid Aouchiche was detained on Oct. 6 by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement outside Masjid Al-Furqan in Detroit, on his way to the pre-dawn Fajr prayer with his son and others.

Aouchiche’s wife Lorenda Lewis says he sent his son inside the mosque, and instructed him to call his mother to pick him up. 

“When I went to pick Abdullah up, he was outside by himself, and he said he hadn’t seen his father. He doesn’t know where he is. And then I realized they were parked over to the side, and they let the window down so that the kids can see him for the last time,” she shares.

Aouchiche was taken to the North Lake Processing Center in Baldwin, Michigan, which houses over 1,400 people.

Lewis says it’s been a struggle to visit the facility, due to frequently changing policies, visitation times, and the 4 hour drive. She says the policies discourage you from visiting.

“It will alternate one hour for one week and three hours for the following week. So you will have to get up four o’clock in the morning to be there on time, because if you got there by a certain time… you were not allowed to visit,” she explains. 

Concerns of mistreatment at the facility 

In December, Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib (MI-12), who is a member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, visited the facility, noting its dire conditions.

Tlaib’s office says they received multiple reports, “including frigid temperatures, inadequate food, unsanitary facilities, difficulties accessing attorneys and loved ones, translation and communication issues, and problems obtaining medical care.”

After the visitation, Tlaib released a statement in which she says,  “I am fighting for the freedom and dignity of every immigrant, asylum seeker, and refugee who calls our country home.” 

A family separated

Aouchiche and Lewis share four children, between the ages of 6 and 12. 

Lewis says the current policies do not allow more than four visitors total in a day. With the kids being minors, they were not all able to go back to see their father together.

“But because there’s only four people, and they’re under 18, they could not go back there alone. So I was the only one that can go back there,” she says. 

Lewis says she is concerned about the conditions at the facility.

“They don’t have blankets. They have like a sweater type, something that they sleep with… the heat is horrible and it’s wintertime, but they don’t even have a blanket to sleep with,” she shares. 

Lack of religious accommodations 

Lewis says her husband was not receiving halal food in the beginning—only eating peanut butter, rice, and noodles. Since then, halal food has been provided, she says.

She says she’s also concerned for Muslims who observe fasting and worship during the month of Ramadan, which began Tuesday night. 

“Only in this one pod where he is there are over 300 Muslims… he said they have 12 prayer rugs and no Qurans,” she says. 

She says she’s also concerned whether people will be able to eat a pre-dawn meal to begin fasting, and the meal at sunset to break fast.

“Are they going to accommodate the Muslims getting up four or five o’clock in the morning so that they can eat breakfast at that time and then having suhur, and then having iftar when it’s time to break fast? With the way that they’re doing things, I’m not really sure,” she shares.

Community steps up to support the family 

Lewis says her husband’s detention has put a huge strain on her family.

“Something like this happened all of a sudden, with uncertainty, has taken a lot on my family, the children are having their father around. He paid most of the bills, so now I have to make sure that I work double time and put in extra hours so that I can pay the bills that he was paying,” she says. 

She may have to get a second job to provide for her family, something Lewis says will be difficult in her line of work as a doula.

Community members have put together a GoFundMe to help the family get on their feet. Lewis says she’s grateful people are stepping up to help, but she’s concerned about the funds running out. 

Lewis is also concerned about the mistreatment of others held at the North Lake Detention Facility in Baldwin. She says some people have no one to visit. Lewis says there are efforts to organize bilingual or multilingual volunteers to visit through a team at the Islamic Center of East Lansing by emailing info@lansingislam.com. 

Lewis says she’s leaning on her faith to get her through this time, during the spiritual month of Ramadan and prayer. 

She says there needs to be policy changes in the facility. 

“Their policies need to change, the visitation needs to change… we are not criminals. The detainees there are not criminals, and we’re being treated and our families are being treated like criminals and that needs to stop,” she says. 

Since conducting this interview late last week, Abdelouahid Aouchiche was transferred to Louisiana over the weekend and has since been moved to Texas.

President Trump is continuing to push lies about the 2020 presidential election in Detroit, and using his unsupported claims of fraud to push for federal oversight of midterms.

During an executive order signing to end the government shutdown, Trump told reporters he thinks Republicans should take election rights away from some states that the president did not win in 2020. He used three prominent swing states as examples. 

“Take a look at Detroit… take a look at Pennsylvania… take a look at Philadelphia. You go take a look at Atlanta. Look at some of the places that… horrible corruption on elections.” 

Prominent Republican strategist and Trump-ally Steve Bannon has said ICE agents would be sent to polling places in this year’s midterm elections. 

Detroit City Clerk Janice Winfrey says any attempt to take over voting would be partisan politics at its worst. Winfrey says the results were fair and transparent then and subsequent elections have been, too. The U.S. Constitution says states decide how to conduct elections. Congress can enact some regulations, but the president has no control over elections. 

Additional headlines for Thursday, Feb. 5, 2026

Critique on Sheffield’s order on assessments

The Coalition of Property Tax Justice says Detroit Mayor Mary Sheffield’s recent executive order is too vague and does not do enough to stop over assessments in the city.  

Sheffield signed an order last week aimed at improving transparency in the city’s assessment process and requiring the office to meet national standards.   

Professor Bernadette Athutahene says the order does not specify how to conduct an assessment ratio study, which is required by the property tax reform ordinance.  

“We thought that the executive order would say, you know, to do a mass appraisal report, and those two things are different. The mass appraisal report, you can’t apply Iao standards to a mass appraisal report.”

The coalition did praise Sheffield for requiring the office follow the ratio standards of the International Association of Assessing Officers.  The coalition published a revised version of the executive order with more parameter specifics for a property assessment.  

ICE detention facility proposed in Romulus

A 500 bed ICE detention facility has been proposed for Romulus, but officials say it’s not set in stone. Romulus was among 23 locations nationwide identified in a recent Bloomberg report detailing the Trump administration’s plan to buy warehouses and convert them into ICE detention centers. 

The Washington Post reported in December that a warehouse in Highland Park was being looked at as a potential location. The Mayor of Highland Park has recently said the city was not interested at all and the city lacks the space for such a plan.  

Listen to the latest episode of the “Detroit Evening Report” on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, NPR.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

The killing of two American citizens in Minneapolis by federal immigration officers has forced the country to look more closely at Immigration and Customs Enforcement. When applying that closer lens, that scrutiny moves beyond individual agents to the system itself. It’s one built through laws, budgets, and a long-standing decision to treat immigration as a criminal problem.

César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández, a law professor at Ohio State University, studies the once less known aspects of the U.S. system: where immigration enforcement operates like criminal policing, and detention functions like punishment even when the government calls it “civil.”

His latest book is “Welcome the Wretched: In Defense of the ‘Criminal Alien.'”

García Hernández joined Robyn Vincent on The Metro to discuss what kind of immigration system is actually being built in the name of Americans, and how we got here.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on demand.

Subscribe to The Metro on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, NPR.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

More stories from The Metro

City of Detroit is partnering with organizations to extend stand-by shelters and respite locations due to the extreme cold coming this weekend.

The Neighborhood Service Organization will open from Friday Jan 23 at 6 p.m. to Tuesday, Jan. 27 at noon. This site can only accept single adults.

Pope Francis Center is sheltering people through Jan. 27 at noon as well. They are also only accepting single adults. And the Detroit Rescue Mission Ministries is operating through Jan. 27 at noon. They are accepting families and single adults.

Residents seeking relief from the bitter cold may also visit Detroit recreation centers and public library branches during regular operating hours.

Any individuals sleeping outside and needing help after hours can go to a police precinct to be connected with an outreach team for help with overnight services.

Additional headlines for Friday, Jan. 23, 2026

Due to the deep freeze this weekend, the Detroit Zoo and the Belle Isle Nature Center are closed today and Saturday. Animal care staff worked to ensure the animals continued to receive the care they need. The parks hope to be open on Sunday, but they will monitor the weather forecast before making that decision.

The National Weather service issued a cold weather advisory for all of southeast Michigan that lasts until Saturday morning. The agency says exposed skin could be damaged in as little as half an hour, and they say pet owners should not leave their animals outdoors.

Wayne County Juvenile Detention hosts open interviews

The Wayne County Juvenile Detention Facility is hosting open interviews for two critical roles from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday, Jan. 24 at the Wayne County Criminal Justice Center. They will host a hiring event for individuals interested in becoming one of their Juvenile Detention Specialists or a Crisis Response Team Specialist.

For more information go to waynecountymichigan.gov.

Sports

NBA

The Detroit Pistons are on a 4 game winning streak and hope to extend that today when they face the Houston Rockets. Tipoff for the game is at 7 p.m.

NFL

Detroit Lions offensive tackle Dan Skipper announced his retirement via Instagram on Thursday. Skipper was dealing with a lower back injury all season. He said he will pursue coaching in his future.

Hubbard Street Dance Chicago

Hubbard Street Dance Chicago is performing at the Detroit Opera House Jan. 24-25. The program will feature works from contemporary choreographers and Tony Award–winning Broadway choreographer Bob Fosse.

For more information go to detroitopera.com.

Listen to the latest episode of the “Detroit Evening Report” on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, NPR.org or wherever you get your podcasts.