Leavenworth, Kansas Fights Back
Locals "Just Say No" to CoreCivic
Don’t call it a jail! It’s a “reception center.”
Surprisingly good news from the heartland:
“It was a lovely May evening in Leavenworth, Kansas, but instead of strolling along the Missouri River or gardening, a group of locals sat on squeaky folding chairs at the public library to discuss their mission: How to stop a private prison behemoth from warehousing immigrants down the road. This was happening in a famously pro-prison town, home to one of the oldest federal penitentiaries, and where President Donald Trump won more than 60% of the vote in 2024. Besides the military and the Veterans Affairs medical center, prisons are the largest employer in this community, 30 miles northwest of Kansas City. With federal immigration detention facilities around the country packed due to the Trump administration’s mass deportation efforts, the private prison industry is experiencing a boom. Stock prices of companies like GEO Group and CoreCivic soared as they gained scores of contracts. But when CoreCivic applied earlier this year for a permit in Leavenworth to reopen a prison with a troubled history to hold immigration detainees, city officials balked. And local residents — including some former prison employees — pushed back. … Mike Trapp, a local writer and activist who reserved the room for the library teach-in, said he’s seen some softening recently among his neighbors who are Trump voters. Even those who support the mass deportations “are on our side in not trusting CoreCivic to do the right thing,” he said. … Emails obtained through public records requests show that about a week after Trump was elected, CoreCivic leadership began contacting Leavenworth city officials about reopening their facility there.
“They don't want to do better. They are in it for profit,” Shonk-Little said. “They could give two shits about the people. The more people they have, the better off they are because it's more money in their pocket.” … “They're not looking out for the safety of their inmates or staff,” Levering said of CoreCivic. “They're looking out for their own self-interest, which is taking the taxpayers’ money to line the pockets of their higher-ups.” … [R]esidents are planning a march against the detention center for July 19. They plan to meet 10 days earlier at Momo’s Knitting Nook to make homemade protest signs.” - Cary Aspinwall, The Marshall Project, July 1, 2025.
TACO (TRUMP ALWAYS CHICKENS OUT) NEWS:
“President Donald Trump said in an interview on Fox News that the administration is working to develop a temporary pass for immigrants who work in certain industries, which would be the latest shift in the administration’s approach to immigration enforcement for farmworkers. “We’re working on it right now. We’re going to work it so that some kind of a temporary pass where people pay taxes, where the farmer can have a little control, as opposed to you walk in and take everybody away,” Trump said in an interview that was recorded Friday and aired Sunday on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures.” - NBC News, July 30, 2025. [Just wait a few hours, and Stephen Miller will cancel this initiative.]
GATOR GULAG NEWS:
“Florida’s ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ Everglades prison ignores both environment and history; AG James Uthmeier claims site is ‘abandoned,’ but doesn’t mention that it’s the reason Big Cypress National Preserve exists. … [H]ow about that brilliant plan to house more than 1,000 detainees (plus all their guards) in tents and trailers in a remote area with a single road in and out during hurricane season. And on property that, according to the Miami mayor’s letter, consists of 96% wetlands. This turned into the topic of a lively discussion at this week’s Collier County Commission meeting. Although the airstrip has belonged to Miami-Dade for decades, the detention center sits in Collier. The commissioners made it plain they’d been blindsided by the state like everyone else and wanted nothing to do with whatever happens when the next Ian storms ashore. “Sitting here in the middle of hurricane season, I sure would hate to see this plop in our lap,” Commissioner Rick LoCastro said. “A thousand detainees that were sitting in tents [and] now need food, shelter, transportation, and all that.” “You’re spot on, because even [the land] in between the taxiways is quite low and quite wet,” agreed county emergency management director Dan Sherman. “The contractors are going to have their hands full with anything temporary, even on a good day during the rainy season.” - Craig Pittman, Florida Phoenix, June 26, 2025.
His Orangeness and ICE Barbie, on the wrong side of the fence at Gator Gulag.
IMMIGRATION JUDGE NEWS:
“President Donald Trump said Tuesday he would approve Florida’s plan to expedite deportations by having qualified National Guard members work as immigration judges. Trump made the announcement during his visit to a new state-run immigration detention center in South Florida dubbed Alligator Alcatraz. … According to Florida’s proposed immigration plan from earlier this year, there are nine Judge Advocate General officers in the National Guard who could be trained as immigration officers and training would take six weeks.” - Miami Herald, July 1, 2025.
“RACIST BULLSHIT” NEWS:
“The Trump administration has raised the possibility of stripping Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic mayoral candidate for New York, of his US citizenship as part of a crackdown against foreign-born citizens convicted of certain offences.
Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, appeared to pave the way for an investigation into Mamdani’s status after Andy Ogles, a rightwing Republican congressman for Tennessee, called for his citizenship to be revoked on the grounds that he may have concealed his support for “terrorism” during the naturalization process. … Chris Murphy, a Democratic senator for Connecticut who has become one of the Trump administration’s most effective critics, called the demand to denaturalize Mamdani “racist bullshit”. “Trump will stop at nothing to protect billionaires and price gouging corporations, even racist bullshit like this,” he wrote. “Zohran won because he ran a campaign laser focused on putting power back in the hands of working people. And that’s a threat to the Mar-a-Lago crowd.” - MSN, July 1, 2025.
That’s all for today. Comments always welcome. THANK YOU! to all subscribers, free and paid.
And just say no to racist bullshit, today and every day.
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