President Donald Trump signed a memorandum on Wednesday directing the preparation of a facility at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base to detain tens of thousands of high-risk undocumented immigrants.
The order instructs the Pentagon and the Department of Homeland Security to set up 30,000 beds at the site, which has historically been used as a military prison.
Trump justified the move by stating that some detainees were too dangerous to be sent back to their home countries. He emphasized that Guantanamo is “a tough place to get out of” and that this expansion would double current detention capacity.
The announcement came just before Trump signed the Laken Riley Act, a strict immigration measure with some bipartisan support. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem confirmed that work to expand the facility was already underway, with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) managing operations and detainees being flown directly to the site. The cost of the project remains undetermined, pending congressional appropriations.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth described the facility as a temporary transit center rather than a long-term detention camp. He noted that Guantanamo had previously housed Haitian and Cuban refugees in the 1990s, though past administrations framed such measures as humanitarian efforts rather than deterrence policies.
The Cuban government strongly condemned the move, with President Miguel Díaz-Canel calling it “an act of brutality” and reiterating Cuba’s long-standing objection to the U.S. presence on the island. The Pentagon has not yet issued formal orders for construction, and the White House has yet to clarify further details of the directive.