ICE Awards GardaWorld $17.3 Million to Convert San Antonio Warehouse Into a Service Processing Center

ICE bought the work through a Navy program the Department of Homeland Security said in June it had abandoned.

(Photo: ICE)

Immigration and Customs Enforcement awarded GardaWorld Federal Services $17.3 million on Thursday to renovate an agency-owned building in San Antonio into an immigration processing and detention facility, using the Navy contracting program the Department of Homeland Security said in June it had stopped using for detention work. The award record was posted to SAM.gov, the federal contracting database.

ICE's detention and removals office signed the order Aug. 27. The price is fixed, the work runs one year through Aug. 25, 2027, and the agency has committed the full $17.3 million up front.

The order buys the renovation of an “existing, ICE-owned permanent structure” in San Antonio to serve as a “processing and detention facility,” along with the wraparound services needed to operate it. Wraparound services is ICE's term for the staffing and operations a detention facility requires, including guards, transportation and medical care. That is the same description that ICE used on the orders it issued in in March for warehouses in Williamsport, Md., and Surprise, Ariz.

The orders were placed through WEXMAC TITUS, a Navy supply program built for expeditionary military logistics and expanded in 2025 to cover domestic work for Homeland Security.

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin told a House Appropriations subcommittee on June 25 that the department was no longer using the Navy program for detention services. The statement followed pressure from Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Jeanne Shaheen and a Government Accountability Office review that found oversight failures at the Fort Bliss detention camp procured the same way.

The San Antonio requirement was solicited Dec. 23, 2025, before that retreat. The solicitation ID field is blank and the contract opportunities notice field reads “not applicable,” meaning the work was never posted publicly.

ICE could not be immediately reached for comment.