Marines Begin Arriving In Guantanamo Bay As Trump Admin Seeks To Hold Thousands Of Migrants There

Marines and soldiers have started arriving in Guantanamo Bay to provide begin setting up facilities looking to hold thousands of migrants deported by the Trump administration.

President Trump announced in late January the reopening of the detention facility in the Cuban enclave, saying those targeted to be sent to Guantanamo will be migrants who are living unlawfully in the U.S. but cannot be deported to their home countries.

"I'm Signing an executive order to instruct the departments of Defense and Homeland Security to begin preparing the 30,000 person migrant facility at Guantanamo Bay. We have 30,000 beds to detain the worst criminal illegal aliens threatening the American people," Trump said on Jan. 29.

The New York Times reported that the first wave of Marines arrived on February 1 from Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, with 50 more Marines arriving the following day.

The outlet added that the military declined to comment on its current capacity to receive migrants, while the Southern Command, which has oversight of the troops assigned to Guantanamo and the migration plan, did not say who is in charge of the operation.

The plan showed six designated tent camps for more than 11,000 migrants, with the largest of being able to house more than 3,000 people at once.

Although preparations continue to take place in order to build more tent cities, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said in late January that about 6,000 deportees could be housed "on the golf course."

Despite Trump's plans of detaining up to 30,000 immigrants in Guantanamo, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Navy documents from 2021 and 2022 reviewed by Drop Site New show that the Trump administration may not be able to reach such a figure anytime soon. The documents in fact show that the detention center only has the capacity to hold 400 people at the moment.

Moreover, a Switzerland-based organization believes that number to be even lower, estimating the center's capacity to be at just 130, citing 2009 documents from the private prison company the Geo Group, which helped run the center.

The New York Times also reported last year that the facility held 37 migrants from 2020 to 2023, and, "in the past decade, the number of families has been in the single digits."

Holding immigrants in such facilities is also costly for the government. In fact, that may be the most expensive option, according to an Axios review of various estimates, which put yearly detention costs at $66 billion under Trump's possible mass deportation plans. ICE currently has only about 38,000 people in detention— prioritizing noncitizens the border patrol arrested at the Southwest border and noncitizens with criminal histories.