GOSHEN – By a unanimous vote Thursday evening, the Orange County Legislature opposed the development of an ICE facility in the county.
ICE is currently considering an office or detention center off Route 17K in the Town of Newburgh.
Before lawmakers voted unanimously (14 in opposition to any ICE proposal in the county; seven members were absent), over a dozen people spoke out against any ICE facility.
David Schwartz of the City of Newburgh didn’t mince words. “Processing and detention facilities; what we are really taking about is concentration camps,” he said. “Concentration camps in the United States in 2026, I did not see that coming, and the federal government needs to understand we don’t want this happening here in this country, and especially in this county.”
Lisa Lindsley also spoke out against ICE
“I don’t live in Orange County; I live in Ulster County, but I’m here because since 2008 ICE has built an empire to terrorize my neighbors, your neighbors, Dutchess County’s neighbors, the Capital area’s neighbors, New York City’s neighbors,” she said. “They’re continuing to try to build it here and they are going to keep coming.”
County Legislature Democratic Caucus Leader Genesis Ramos sponsored the anti-ICE resolution.
“It is not coincidental that our county is being targeted when we have an abundance of warehouses, some of them sitting empty in this county,” she said. “It was Chester earlier this year. It is the Town of Newburgh today. It could be any other municipality in this county tomorrow.”
ICE has remained mum about that it may want to do with the Newburgh facility that it purchased from a Texas company.
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