U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has abandoned efforts to build a detention center in Newport, at least for now, according to court filings first reported by the Statesman Journal.
But ICE’s statements have not ruled out reviving the project in the future, Newport Mayor Jan Kaplan said Wednesday. Kaplan called on community leaders to remain vigilant.
“At present, ICE has no plan or intention to begin construction or to open a temporary holding/processing facility in or around the City of Newport, Oregon or anywhere within Lincoln County, Oregon,” Ralph Ferguson, acting assistant director for ICE enforcement and removal operations, declared in a filing submitted Friday to the U.S. District Court of Oregon.
Kaplan called Ferguson’s statement “a positive step,” but also said federal officials have not communicated clearly or openly with Newport officials about their plans.
FILE - Protesters gather with signs outside of Newport City Hall on Nov. 12, 2025. An ICE official said in a court filing last week that the agency has halted plans to build a detention center in the city.
Brianna Bowman / KLCC
“We are pursuing further assurances that ICE will not construct any detention facility, temporary or permanent,” he said in a statement.
“ICE has left our community in a state of uncertainty,” Kaplan said. “We will remain actively engaged until ICE has made a decision, and we will only be satisfied when that decision is to make a permanent commitment not to establish a detention facility in Newport.”
Officials with ICE and with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the immigration agency, did not answer questions from OPB about whether the immigration agency might revive its plans for Newport, or if it might explore other locations in Oregon.
Instead, officials with the Homeland Security media relations office responded with the photos and names of five men the agency described as “illegal criminal aliens” arrested by ICE in the state.
“DHS is conducting law enforcement activities across the country to keep Americans safe,” Homeland Security said in an unsigned statement. “It should not come as news that ICE will be making arrests in states across the U.S. and is actively working to expand detention space.”
Ferguson’s declaration that ICE is not actively working to build a detention center was submitted along with a Homeland Security motion asking U.S. District Court Judge Ann Aiken to dismiss Oregon’s lawsuit against the agency.
FILE - An undated photo of the Yaquina Bay Bridge in Newport.
Kristian Foden-Vencil / OPB
The state is suing to prevent ICE from building a detention center. Homeland Security says Oregon can’t sue to stop a project that is not already in the works.
In its motion to dismiss the case, however, the agency details steps ICE took to establish a foothold in Lincoln County.
“ICE had begun environmental compliance activities” to explore using the Coast Guard’s airport space for its planned temporary holding and processing facility, the agency said. It had reached out to the Oregon Department of Land Conservation and Development and was getting ready to send tribal consultation letters, but had not made “irretrievable commitment of resources” or started construction work.
In fact, ICE did far more than that – working with a contractor who was looking into buying and leasing a total of 15 acres near the Newport airport, contacting a local hotel about reserving 200 rooms for up to a year, and soliciting work to support construction. In court filings, the state says ICE was also looking to set up health services and refugee care operations in Newport.
Those efforts raised alarm in Lincoln County, where Newport is the county seat.
As ICE was making initial preparations for a detention center, the Coast Guard relocated a helicopter that had been based in Newport for more than 40 years. That led to a local outcry from fishermen, tourism officials and community leaders – who say the rescue helicopter plays a vital role in saving lives from often rough seas, and who also claim the helicopter was moved in violation of federal law.
Ferguson’s declaration confirmed that ICE needed the Coast Guard’s airport space in order to build its planned detention center, and ended those efforts after the helicopter was returned to Newport.
Kaplan said Newport leaders “will only be satisfied” when ICE makes “a permanent commitment not to establish a detention facility in Newport.”
“We will continue our litigation until we secure sufficient guarantees that they will take no action, now or in the future, that threatens the well-being of our community,” he said.
