Sen. Chris Van Hollen thanks county officials for action against ICE detention center in Maryland

Kiersten Hacker, The Baltimore Sun on Feb 4, 2026

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BALTIMORE — U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen thanked Howard County lawmakers Wednesday for their actions to block a planned U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility in Elkridge, Maryland, while calling for “not one more dime for a lawless ICE.”

Van Hollen’s updates came as Howard County Executive Calvin Ball and the Howard County Council work to block the retrofitting of an Elkridge office building into an immigration detention facility. The building is owned by Genesis GSA Strategic One LLC, but last August, another company, McKeever Services, received a permit to renovate the space into a detention facility. A public hearing on emergency county legislation is planned for Wednesday night, with a vote coming Thursday.

Work on the building was nearing completion, with the project passing an inspection on Dec. 29 with some conditions. When filing emergency legislation last Friday, Ball wasn’t aware of any contracts between the building’s owner or the contracting company and any federal agency. However, it was revealed the building was intended for ICE occupation, and under the state code, the building met the definition of an immigration detention facility, Ball said.

The building permit was revoked, Ball announced Monday, and the County Council is working to pass emergency legislation blocking detention centers in privately owned buildings.

Van Hollen told members of the Howard County delegation to the Maryland General Assembly Wednesday morning that the country has witnessed the “horrors” of the killings of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti by ICE agents in Minneapolis, examples of an “out of control, lawless ICE operation.”

“But what’s happening in Minneapolis is happening to some degree or another in every part of our country, including in our state of Maryland, where people are constantly disappeared, and we’re tracking many cases, really, as we speak,” Van Hollen said.

With 11 days left to pass funding for the Department of Homeland Security before it runs out, he called for dramatic reforms to ICE and DHS before they receive more money.

Van Hollen said Congress should pass funding for certain facets of DHS, such as the Transportation Security Administration, the U.S Coast Guard and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, then address ICE and Border Patrol. However, Van Hollen said he’s skeptical that Republicans will support the meaningful reforms needed.

Currently, ICE and Border Patrol have received mandatory advanced funding through President Trump’s One, Big Beautiful Bill, Van Hollen said.

“So, ICE, for example, has seven times its annual appropriation in a bank account of permanent money, $70 billion,” Van Hollen said. “I would like to claw that back, but that’s not something we imagine that, you know, Trump would sign or Republicans would pass.”

Van Hollen said he’s visited the ICE holding facility in Baltimore several times after being denied entry at first, and said it is violating standards, holding people in inhumane conditions and breaking the law by not allowing lawmakers to visit unannounced. Republican lawmaker U.S. Rep. Andy Harris blamed the Biden administration for the conditions at the Baltimore facilty, saying that if illegal border crossings hadn’t surged under the Democrat’s presidency, “this necessary detainment facility would not be as crowded.”

In Washington County, DHS and ICE purchased an old Hagerstown warehouse to turn into an immigration processing facility, so there’s a “very big problem” in Maryland, Van Hollen said.

But through his concerns, seeing Marylanders fight for their neighbors, record interactions and warn others motivates him, Van Hollen said.

“It’s always heartening for me to know that in Annapolis, you and all the others gathered here are doing your best to protect our state,” Van Hollen said to Howard lawmakers. “But I appreciate that, because I wake up every day thinking I never imagined we’d be experiencing this moment in our country. I mean, it is constantly, sort of terrified, in one sense.”

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