A Grassroots Group Helped Expose a Maryland ICE Detention Facility. Officials Didn't Invite Them to the Table.
Maryland Gov. Wes Moore's office promised a local advocacy group a seat at Monday's ICE facility roundtable with U.S. Rep. April McClain Delaney. Then they were told no.
When Gov. Wes Moore and U.S. Rep. April McClain Delaney (D-Md.) sit down Monday in Hagerstown to discuss the planned ICE detention facility in neighboring Williamsport, a community organization among the most vocal opponents of the project since it was first reported will not be in the room.
Hagerstown Rapid Response was not invited. Among those excluded: Ethan Wechtaluk, an HRR member who is also challenging McClain Delaney in the Democratic primary for Maryland's 6th Congressional District.
“We were told directly from someone on Governor Moore’s team that they would reach out to Representative Delaney’s team to get Hagerstown Rapid Response a seat at this roundtable,” said Patrick Dattilio, a founder of the group. “When we followed up ourselves, that’s when we were told we wouldn’t be allowed in. The irony couldn’t be clearer: they’re coming here because of us, but they don’t want us in the room.”
The sequence that led to that rejection began on social media, where HRR members had begun voicing frustration about their exclusion from the roundtable. A staffer from Moore's office reached out to Dattilio on Instagram and said she would contact McClain Delaney's team to secure them a spot. Nearly 24 hours passed. When Dattilio followed up with the same Moore staffer, he was told the group would not be included.
The disconnect became public Sunday on Facebook, where a post by United Democrats of Washington County asking who had been invited drew dozens of frustrated comments. Emily Keller, Maryland’s Special Secretary of Overdose Response and a former mayor of Hagerstown, wrote in to explain the closed-door format — saying the meeting was private, held with a small group of select stakeholders, and that some attendees may not be able to speak publicly for fear of retaliation from their own boards or over federal funding concerns.
When commenters pressed for the full invite list, Keller said she didn’t know who had been invited or why, and that she had only been trying to save people the inconvenience of showing up to a closed meeting.
Hagerstown Rapid Response was among several community organizations that formed in the days after The Washington Post reported on Christmas Eve that the Trump administration was moving to convert warehouses nationwide into immigration detention facilities, with Williamsport among the targets. The group organized sustained opposition, protesting repeatedly outside Washington County Board of County Commissioners meetings where a suspension of public comment forced demonstrators to stand in silence while the all-Republican board voted unanimously to back DHS and ICE.
The federal government purchased the warehouse for $102.4 million in January, and Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown subsequently obtained a temporary restraining order pausing construction.
On Sunday, the group sent a formal letter to Moore and McClain Delaney calling for a full public town hall to follow Monday’s closed session. Hagerstown Rapid Response won’t be in the room when officials discuss what to do about it.
Well this tells us everything we need to know about Moore. He's looking out only for himself, shameful. He acts just like old establishment dems....smdh
these buildings and secrecy only aid and abet the fascist regime's agenda e.g. Ice agents with weapons etc at every u.s. airport in usa starting on Mar 23 2026. per DHS public notice.
that facility and the owners should be sued in Federal court. the stakeholders may think they are going to get rich while the whole operation may be a federal felony civil rights crime.
Hagerstown MD may become the new Auschwitz Torture Center for detained children. something MD may become proud of like the U.S. Naval Academy.