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ICE used a warehouse in NJ. Locals are ‘frustrated’ by Sherrill’s response.
By
Mike Hayes
Published Oct 27, 2026 at 6:30 a.m. ET
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Office of Governor / Tim Larsen
By
Mike Hayes
Published Oct 27, 2026 at 6:30 a.m. ET
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New Jersey immigration activists and a local elected official said they are disappointed in the lack of action by state officials in the wake of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency’s admission it used a warehouse site in Roxbury to process people it had detained.
“I'm really frustrated because a lot of communities are suffering, and the response just seems very lukewarm,” said Sandra Wittner, a town council member from Dover.
In September, activists with a group called PROJECT NINJA, or the No Ice in North Jersey Alliance, submitted photos, videos and detainee testimony to the state attorney general purporting to prove people were arrested by ICE in Dover and driven about five miles west to the Roxbury warehouse. The Trump administration plans to convert the facility into a 1500-person immigration detention center but has so far been blocked by a federal judge in a lawsuit brought by New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill.
The governor and her attorney general, Jennifer Davenport, pledged to hold ICE “accountable” and take legal action if they determined the Trump administration had violated that court order.
Then came a revelation from ICE officials on Oct. 13. In an email to New Jersey Rep. Analilia Mejia, the agency admitted it had brought detainees to the Roxbury site for initial processing after they were arrested in Dover on two occasions, on Sept. 4 and 8.
Two weeks after ICE’s admission, neither Sherrill or Davenport have taken additional legal action.
“We're not actually clear on why,” said PROJECT NINJA co-founder Birdie Green. “ It's very frustrating to be screaming at the top of your lungs like, ‘There's something wrong here. We need somebody to do something about it,’ and to get no response.”
In emailed statements, both said they were told by the Trump administration that ICE would no longer bring detainees to the Roxbury site. A spokesperson for the attorney general, Michael Symons, said her office is continuing to review reports that ICE detained people at the warehouse.
“We will continue to review the facts carefully, and we will take appropriate action if we learn that ICE is violating a court order,” Symons said.
But neither statement addressed why New Jersey officials haven't taken further legal action to hold ICE accountable for the activity it already acknowledged.
The Trump administration’s plans for the Roxbury warehouse has become a flashpoint in the local Congressional race, where incumbent Republican Rep. Tom Kean Jr. is vying against Democrat Rebecca Bennett. ICE’s use of the warehouse has faced stiff opposition from local residents and local officials. Kean has faced criticism from his own party over his lack of engagement on the issue, and Bennett has fared favorably in recent polls showing the seat could help Democrats regain the House of Representatives in next week’s midterm elections.
Wittner said the lack of action follows a pattern among state leaders. She said she’s seen little done to crack down on ICE agents who flout other New Jersey laws — specifically the state’s ban on agents wearing masks and a requirement that their automobiles be equipped with license plates on the front and back of any vehicle.
“Where is the empowerment of our law enforcement to actually uphold those laws?” she said. “ There's no point in saying it if you're not gonna actually empower anybody to do what they can to actually uphold those laws.”
Roxbury is well outside Wittner’s Dover council district, but she said she was compelled to get more fully involved in opposition to the warehouse detention facility by a message in September on a community WhatsApp group. A Dover resident had posted saying her father had been taken by ICE.
On the morning of Sept. 4, Wittner said, ICE had conducted a series of raids in the North Jersey town, adding that ICE activity has become a regular occurrence in her community where more than three-quarters of the population is Latino. A little after 8 a.m., she said WhatsApp groups set-up by a rapid response team of anti-ICE locals and activists lit up like a Christmas tree with messages: “My coworker was taken," "My cousin was taken," "My neighbor was taken," "My dad was taken."
“The message about the dad was what prompted us to really dig into this deeper,” Wittner told Gothamist.
Wittner said she spoke with the man’s daughter later that day. The woman’s father told her ICE had driven him west from Dover after his arrest.
“He thought maybe he was near Pennsylvania, and that they were in a building,” Wittner said, recounting her conversation with the man’s daughter. “She knew about Roxbury, and she's like, ‘Well, there's nowhere else he could have gone.’”
That account, along with videos taken by local residents purporting to show ICE vehicles driving from Dover to the Roxbury site, became the basis for activists’ claims that the Trump administration was violating the federal court order forbidding ICE from using the Roxbury site to detain people it arrests.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security told Gothamist the agency cannot comment on ICE’s use of the facility due to the pending litigation.
ICE has said no detainees have been brought inside the warehouse. But David Broderick, an attorney for PROJECT NINJA, said the court’s order against conducting enforcement activities covers the whole site — not just the warehouse.
Green said she hopes Davenport’s office will seek a contempt of court order against ICE. Wittner said she wants state officials to fight harder to be allowed to inspect the site. Rep. Mejia has been asking to visit but thus far her request has been ignored by ICE, according to her office.
“I don't know why the state isn't demanding to get in there to,” Wittner said. “There has to be something they can do.
Broderick said he will be looking for the New Jersey attorney general to take additional action by November 16 when the White House and state officials are due to provide status reports on discussions between the parties to the judge.
“I hope that the state does want to make a point that ICE just can't willy-nilly violate court orders without some type of sanction,” he said. “They've already been sort of publicly humiliated and embarrassed. Hopefully, there'll be more to it.”
Tagged
Mikie Sherrill
new jersey
Mike Hayes
Mike Hayes covers equity and access to opportunity in New Jersey. He joined WNYC and Gothamist in 2023. Before that, he worked as a freelance journalist writing about policing and criminal justice. He has written for ProPublica, CNN, HuffPost, BuzzFeed News and The Appeal. He is also the author of the book, “The Secret Files: Bill De Blasio, The NYPD, and the Broken Promises of Police Reform.” In 2019, he was a finalist for the Livingston Award for Young Journalists.
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