Mecklenburg County (where Charlotte is) will be getting a new federal immigration court in a few months. The federal government therefore was also looking into putting in a new ICE detention facility, but for reasons as yet unknown there are “insurmountable obstacles” to doing so, and therefore the feds are looking to Gaston County (immediately west of here).
This is a difficult issue. It is entirely possible that local authorities did not want to be associated with it—compared to many other places, Charlotte has not seen the same level of inflammatory immigration rhetoric. On the other hand, the article also quotes Alan Gordon, an immigration attorney who was head of the mayor’s Immigration Study Commission. I've done some work with him and have a tremendous amount of respect for him, and he actually argued in favor of getting a detention facility because even if there is a judge in Charlotte, the individual would have to be shipped off elsewhere to wait for proceedings. Therefore one could argue that a detention center here would likely be easier on everyone concerned, including families.
Nonetheless, I do dislike the idea of having Charlotte associated with an ICE facility just for symbolic reasons.
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