Trump administration’s grand scheme to turn Fort Bliss, Texas, into a tent city extravaganza for tens of thousands of immigrants has face-planted spectacularly, according to two insiders and a government document that NBC News peeked at.
Picture this: President Trump, with his trademark flair for the dramatic, initially wanted to transform Guantánamo Bay into a 30,000-bed Airbnb for detainees. But, alas, the price tag and logistical nightmares sent that idea to the cutting-room floor faster than a bad reality TV pitch. So, the administration pivoted to Fort Bliss, envisioning a sprawling canvas metropolis run by Deployed Resources—a company better known for supplying port-a-potties for music festivals and disaster zones than for building detention empires.
The government tossed a cool $3.8 billion contract at Deployed Resources, probably expecting a tent city so fabulous it’d make Coachella jealous. But last week, in a move straight out of a bureaucratic blooper reel, the contract vanished from the public records database with a note saying it was terminated “for convenience.”
The document name-dropped Trump’s executive order on “radical transparency” and “wasteful spending,” but whether this was about saving pennies or just someone hitting the wrong button remains a mystery. Deployed Resources, apparently too busy folding tents or dodging reporters, didn’t return calls for comment.
A Department of Homeland Security bigwig, who moonlights as an ICE overseer, confirmed the contract’s demise but teased that a “revised procurement action” for Fort Bliss is still in the works—like a sequel nobody asked for. “We’re exploring all options to meet our detention needs,” the official said, probably while staring at a whiteboard covered in question marks.
Trump’s dream of breaking deportation records is stuck in a traffic jam because there’s nowhere to park all these immigrants before they’re sent packing. Building detention spaces that meet federal court rules—think individual beds, showers, and not turning into a sauna—is proving trickier than assembling IKEA furniture without instructions. Fort Bliss was supposed to be Deployed Resources’ big break into the ICE detention game, a step up from their usual gig of holding migrants for a quick 72-hour Border Patrol pit stop. But ICE facilities need to be more like a budget hotel than a pop-up campsite, and tents just aren’t cutting it.
Currently, ICE’s 141 detention centers are stuffed with 47,928 detainees, overshooting Congress’s approved 41,500 beds. That’s like inviting extra guests to a party but forgetting to budget for snacks—ICE might run out of cash before the fiscal year’s over. Insiders say brick-and-mortar detention centers, while sturdier, take forever to build, like waiting for your grandma to knit a sweater.
Tents, or soft-sided facilities in fancy government-speak, are quicker but riskier, like betting on a paper umbrella in a hurricane. Federal court settlements demand non-punitive conditions—running water, AC, the works—which tents struggle to deliver, leaving migrants and officers in a sweaty, insecure mess.
So, here we are, watching the Trump administration’s detention dreams deflate like a cheap air mattress. Will Fort Bliss rise from the ashes, or is this just another chapter in the comedy of errors?
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