Department of Homeland Security

Federal officials first toured the building in January, sparking speculation over whether the owners had sold the building to the U.S. government. Media reports suggested the sale was part of a push to use warehouses across the country as immigration detention centers.

The Unified Government’s Planning Commission advanced a two-year ban on special permits for jails and detention centers. In a letter to federal officials, U.S. Rep. Sharice Davids opposed any ICE detention centers in the Kansas City area.

Port KC commissioners voted to terminate and refrain from any negotiations with Platform Ventures. The company owns a south Kansas City warehouse rumored to be part of a federal plan to convert such spaces into immigration detention facilities.

A new NPR/PBS News/Marist poll finds a jump in disapproval of the agency among Democrats and independents, but Republicans are standing by ICE and the president.

Green card holder Owen Ramsingh has spent months in a U.S. detention center in El Paso, Texas, where at least three people have died in recent weeks. Columbia community groups have raised funds to support the family's move to The Netherlands.

Senate Democrats say they are unwilling to fund the Department of Homeland Security without major reforms, raising the likelihood of a partial government shutdown at the end of this week.

Roughly 1.4 million federal workers are going without pay due to the government shutdown — including 30,000 in the Kansas City area. About half of them are furloughed, while the other half has been deemed essential and is working without pay.

Rep. Sam Graves of Tarkio is trying to pass a major overhaul of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, including taking it out of the purview of the Department of Homeland Security.

The arrests of the workers at El Potro Mexican Café in February were among the first in the Kansas City area to draw widespread media attention. Immigration attorneys sued the Trump administration for making arrests without a warrant.

The Missouri senator said that Fort Leonard Wood, a large military installation with a long history of training soldiers and military law enforcement, should be used to help ICE.

As the Trump administration ramps up its mass deportation campaign, with several recent incidents of ICE raids in Kansas City, civil rights advocates nationally and locally are emphasizing training for bystanders and a heightened attention to nonviolent civil disobedience.

The Trump administration’s plans for expanded immigration detentions include Kansas. While a 1,000-bed facility in Leavenworth is on hold, the majority of the state’s detention plays out in a Flint Hills jail.