Measles Outbreak Locks Down Nation's Largest ICE Detention Facility, Spreads Into El Paso Community

Texas Tribune, Fox 7 Austin, and AOL News all report that:

1. At least 14 active measles cases have been confirmed at Camp East Montana, the nation's largest ICE detention facility in El Paso, Texas, with 112 additional people placed in isolation. The soft-sided tent structure holds an average of around 3,000 detainees and has been closed to visitors and attorneys until approximately March 19–20.

2. The outbreak has spread beyond the facility, with four additional community cases confirmed in El Paso among people in their 20s and 30s. Rep. Veronica Escobar warned that detainees with measles are being quarantined at local hospitals, and that hundreds of staff members and 56 Texas National Guard personnel could be carrying the disease into the wider community.

3. The outbreak is part of a broader pattern of measles at ICE facilities nationwide and has intensified calls to shut down the camp over its operator, Acquisition Logistics LLC — a Virginia contractor with no prior ICE facility experience that was awarded a $1.2 billion contract to build and run the facility.

The outbreak has ignited fierce criticism online and in Congress. Rep. Escobar and congressional Democrats formally called on the Department of Homeland Security to close Camp East Montana in a letter dated February 26. Public health advocates have pointed to the facility's overcrowded tent conditions as a textbook environment for infectious disease transmission, while critics have renewed scrutiny of the decision to award a $1.2 billion contract to an inexperienced operator. A separate measles outbreak was confirmed at the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley in late January, signaling a systemic failure across the ICE detention network.