Buckley Space Force Base in Aurora, Colorado, will not process and house detained immigrants after all, U.S. Rep. Jason Crow told reporters Monday during a news conference outside the sprawling, windswept facility.
The announcement by the fourth-term congressman contradicted a statement last week from the military’s U.S. Northern Command, potentially reflecting an about-face by the Trump administration. Last week, a statement issued by the Northern Command said U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement would use the military base as a “temporary operations center, staging area and a temporary holding location for the receiving, holding and processing” of detainees.
During a visit to the base Monday morning, the Aurora Democrat said, he was told by base officials that Buckley “will not be used to house immigrants and detainees — that it will only be used as a staging location for law enforcement and a coordination center for ongoing operations.”
The Denver Post contacted the Northern Command for clarification but a spokeswoman for the command said any information would have to come from ICE. Meanwhile, ICE spokesman Steve Kotecki told The Post on Monday to contact Northern Command.
Crow told reporters that Buckley “is being used for Homeland Security operations, for ICE operations — that there is a footprint of federal law enforcement operating out of this facility.”
“I think it’s too early to tell what that is going to mean,” he said, “but I’m going to continue to push hard and … let the people who I represent know what’s being done in their name, and what’s being done with their taxpayer dollar.”
Crow, an Army combat veteran, was highly critical of the move by ICE to use Buckley for any detention when news of it first broke last week. On Monday, he said that detaining migrants there could pull military personnel away from their primary duties and have “an impact on our core national security missions and the morale of the force.”
The focus on the Aurora military base comes nearly a week after media reports surfaced that ICE raids in Aurora were set to start as early as last Thursday. But those plans reportedly were postponed because of publicity around the potential operation.
Earlier, on Jan. 26, federal officials said more than 40 undocumented immigrants were arrested in an Adams County raid.
Raquel Lane-Arellano, the communications manager for the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition, said that while the latest information about Buckley from Crow was “comforting,” the threat to Aurora’s immigrant community was not gone.
“Trump still has Aurora as a target and is likely to launch some raid operation there,” Lane-Arellano said. “I think the damage has been done to the community. We are not going to hold our breath and wait to see what happens. We are preparing our communities for worst-case scenarios.”
She said the Colorado Rapid Response Network, to which residents can report ICE activity in the community, is up and running.
“The main purpose is to spread information, not fear, within the community so that people can be aware and protect themselves and their families,” Lane-Arellano said.
Crow told reporters Monday that when it comes to people who are living in the country illegally, there is a difference between those who commit crimes and those who do not.
“Nobody disputes that if you have violent criminals on the streets, we should detain those folks — and if they’re unlawful, to deport them. A mass deportation is different by definition,” he said. “The word ‘mass’ says they’re going to go after a larger category of folks, otherwise law-abiding people. These are our business owners. These are families. These are mixed-status families, in many cases, right?”
Crow said that in his first days in office six years ago, he was focused on keeping an eye on ICE’s detention center in Aurora, which is operated by private prison company the GEO Group under a federal contract. That facility can house more than 1,500 people.
He’ll do the same with Buckley, he said.
“I, of course, know that things change and evolve,” Crow said. “That’s why we’re going to do regular check-ins, regular oversight and we’re going to pay close attention to how things change if they do.”
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