ICE Awards $240,000 Sole-Source Contract for Land Deals in Arizona, Florida, and New York
The July 1 filing ties a no-bid title and escrow contract with First American to property purchases at three existing ICE detention sites but does not say what land is being bought or from whom.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is preparing to buy real property at three of its existing detention facilities — in Florence, Ariz.; Krome, Fla.; and Batavia, N.Y. — according to a procurement justification the agency posted to SAM.gov on July 1.
The document, a Justification for Other Than Full and Open Competition numbered J&A-26-0143, discloses a sole-source, $240,000 contract awarded June 2 to First American Title Insurance Co. of Santa Ana, Calif., for title abstract, escrow and settlement services tied to the three sites.
ICE's Office of Acquisition Management, the agency's contracting arm, issued the award on behalf of its real estate division, the Office of Asset and Facilities Management. The $240,000 contract is split into two parts: a four-month base period worth $60,000, plus an eight-month option for additional service ICE can exercise later for $180,000. ICE did not post the justification publicly until July 1, a month after the award.
While the justification does not name any specific parcel, seller or acreage at any of the three locations, it does state that the existing processing centers “will be expanded to enable additional administrative, medical, training and detention facilities and space.”
ICE's justification cites "unusual and compelling urgency" as grounds for bypassing competitive bidding, attributing the accelerated timeline to seller-imposed deadlines and the timing of the property selection process rather than to any delay by the contracting office. It defines that urgency as the risk of losing the properties outright: without an immediate award, sellers could walk away from negotiations, accept competing offers, or raise the price, and any resulting delay could push back construction and other mission plans tied to the sites.
The filing adds that a market search conducted from April 7 through May 7 concluded that First American was the only vendor able to perform the work within that timeframe. Records on USAspending.gov show ICE previously contracted with the company for a $25,000 purchase order covering title and escrow services at an undisclosed location, issued in October 2025 and also on behalf of the Office of Asset and Facilities Management.
Florence, Ariz.
At the Central Arizona Florence Correctional Center, owned & operated by CoreCivic under contract with ICE, a Haitian asylum seeker named Emmanuel Damas died this year after what fellow detainees described as repeated, unaddressed requests for treatment of a tooth infection.
Arizona Reps. Greg Stanton, Yassamin Ansari and Adelita Grijalva, all Democrats, have called for an independent investigation, and Ansari has said detainees told her Damas was not taken to a hospital until others protested outside his cell, according to KJZZ. CoreCivic has referred questions about the death to ICE.
In Marana, roughly an hour from Florence, Pima County supervisors have passed a resolution opposing a separate, proposed ICE detention facility, and local advocacy groups have organized against it, according to AZ Luminaria.
Krome, Fla.
The Krome North Service Processing Center in western Miami-Dade County is owned by ICE and operated under contract by Akima Global Services. It opened in 1980 and was designed to hold roughly 600 people, a capacity its population has repeatedly exceeded over the past year, with detainees and attorneys describing men sleeping on floors, near toilets and on buses for hours while awaiting processing, according to reporting by WPTV and CBS Miami.
ICE contracted with Akima Global Services to erect a tent structure on the facility grounds to house an additional 250 men in April 2025.
Last month, ICE evacuated Krome because of nearby wildfires, relocating detainees to other sites in Florida and elsewhere. ICE has said some of its facilities are experiencing temporary overcrowding and that it is working to manage capacity through detainee transfers and expedited case processing.
Batavia, N.Y.
The Buffalo Federal Detention Facility, also known as the Buffalo Service Processing Center, is government-owned and operated under contract by Akima Global Services. It has housed more detainees than its stated capacity of 650 beds for much of the past year. Federal data compiled by TRAC Immigration showed the facility’s population reached 745 in February, an increase of 200 people over the prior year, according to WHAM. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand’s office has said it has been monitoring conditions at the facility and has pressed ICE to address crowding.
ICE and First American Title Insurance Co. did not respond to requests for comment for this article.
More waste, fraud and abuse coming from this fascist, traitorus, criminal administration!!
I would love to see agents housed in a tent at Krome! Aside from the fires we have heat advisories, thunderstorms and who knows what hurricane season will bring. Overcrowding and abuses of detainees has been documented there for as long as I can remember.