Throughline (NPR): "The Business of Migrant Detention"
Release Date: September 18, 2025
Hosts: Rund Abdelfatah and Ramtin Arablouei
Featured Guest: Brianna Nofil (Assistant Professor of History, William & Mary; author of The Migrants’ Jail: An American History of Mass Incarceration)

Overview

This episode takes a deep, historical dive into the origins and evolution of migrant detention in the United States, tracing it from 19th-century county jails along the Canadian border to today’s vast system of federal, state, local, and private facilities. The show unpacks how U.S. immigration policy has continually relied on a business model—“the commoditization of people”—driven by economic incentives for rural counties, sheriffs, and private prison companies. It’s a story about how the nation’s approach to migration is interwoven with racism, economic motives, and bipartisan politics, revealing the complexities and contradictions at the heart of America’s dealings with immigrants.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Early Days: County Jails and the Chinese Exclusion Era (1900s)

[00:45 - 08:55; 09:00 - 17:46]

• Pulteney Bigelow’s 1903 Reporting:
  Bigelow, a reporter, exposes a rural New York jail overflowing with Chinese migrants not charged with crimes but held for immigration hearings after the Chinese Exclusion Act barred their entry.

  • “We put them in jail first and let them prove their innocence afterward.”
    — Pulteney Bigelow as recounted by Brianna Nofil [03:20]
  • Notably, Bigelow, despite his own racist views, is shocked by the administrative warehousing of migrants:
    • “I have no hesitation in pronouncing our present means of excluding Chinamen as one gigantic and complicated fraud.” — Bigelow [03:48]

• Sheriff’s Business Incentive:

  • Local sheriff Ernest Douglas personally profits by detaining migrants, as his salary increases per inmate held.
    • “Sheriffs in most of the country at this point… didn’t get an annual salary…your salary as sheriff would have depended on how many people you held in the local jail.” — Brianna Nofil [10:02]
    • “Once he finds that he can start detaining immigrants…this is a pretty spectacular new income source for the sheriff.” [10:38]
  • Douglas treats Chinese detainees as “pets” and is delighted by the extra income [11:23-11:38].

• Legal Resistance & the Growth of a Market:

  • Chinese migrants, often coached by community groups, file habeas corpus claims, usually asserting U.S. citizenship—few are actually deported.
  • Neighboring counties compete for federal detention business, building custom “Chinese jails” and offering better terms—emerging as a true market for human detention.
    • “You really see the emergence of a market.” — Nofil [14:25]

• Commodification and Tragedy:

  • Local economies benefit (food supplies, hotel stays for witnesses, jailers’ salaries).
  • Systemic cruelty: deaths in detention prompt public outrage and editorials decrying “a shame upon civilized government.”
    • “There are many deaths in this wooden detention house.” — Letter from detainees [16:40]
    • “The present Chinese exclusion law and its administration is a shame upon civilized government.” — Malone Farmer Editorial [17:02]

• Federalization and Shift to the Southern Border:

  • As the route becomes too well-known, migration shifts; Supreme Court upholds the government’s authority to deport, and the administrative model persists.

2. The Federal Takeover & the Cold War Era

[20:17 - 34:32]

• Ellis Island’s Transformation:

  • By the 1940s, Ellis Island is more a detention center than a processing center. Notorious cases, like Ellen Knopf’s, highlight indefinite detentions without due process.
    • “She kind of becomes this celebrity, emblematic of the excesses of detention power.” — Brianna Nofil [21:36]
  • Supreme Court backs indefinite administrative detention; activists decry civil liberty violations.

• Eisenhower’s Reform Attempt:

  • Official narrative: shift to “humane administration,” ending routine immigrant imprisonment in the East.
    • “Through humane administration, the Department of Justice is doing what it legally can to alleviate hardships. The imprisonment of aliens awaiting admission or deportation has been stopped.” — Eisenhower quoted by Nofil [23:26]
  • In reality, while Europeans are released on parole, detention on the southern border ramps up, particularly targeting Mexican migrants post-Bracero program.

• Operation Wetback:

  • Massive campaign to detain and deport Mexican migrants, justified as protecting American jobs but also driven by racism and economic anxiety.
    • “The roundup of Wetback swung into its second day today with the first day’s catch of more than 2,000 illegal immigrants termed Very Successful.” — Newsreel [26:14]

• Federal Detention Facilities Spark Local Backlash and Bidding:

  • When the federal government seeks to build a detention camp in Brownsville, Texas, counties formerly benefiting from jail contracts rebel.

    • “Counties will be, quote, left holding the bag because the immigration bureau decides it wants to increase its staff and duties and go into the prison business on a grandiose scale.” — Congressman Lloyd Benson [28:41]

  • McAllen, Texas, ultimately welcomes the center, marking the shift to large, federally-managed migrant detention camps.

• Turning Points:

  • Federal willingness to build infrastructure for deportation, with less public outcry when detentions target “faceless Mexican migrants.”
    • “They start really imagining detention as something that might deter people.” — Nofil [33:20]
  • Short-term detentions replace months-long ones; U.S. aims to make the process less visible and less legally contestable.

3. Rise of Mass Incarceration & Private Detention (1980s — Present)

[36:52 - 53:26]

• Oakdale & Atlanta Uprisings (1987):

  • Cubans held indefinitely after serving criminal sentences—no country to accept them leads to unrest and the largest hostage crises in U.S. prison history.
    • “Can the U.S. hold people indefinitely?” — Nofil [38:52]
    • “If you are looking for kind of a powder keg of a situation, it is kind of hard to imagine people who feel more desperate…” — Nofil [41:29]
  • Afterward, the federal government decentralizes detention again, contracting with local jails across the U.S.—especially attractive to struggling rural economies.

• Local Economic Incentives:

  • Sheriff Bill Belt in Evoyles Parish, Louisiana, becomes a model: five detention facilities emerge in a community of 40,000, employing hundreds.
    • “Folks are seeing what Bell is doing in his parish, and they are saying, huh, it doesn’t seem like demand for immigration detention space is going away. Like, maybe this is the industry of the future.” — Nofil [45:53]
  • Communities bid for contracts, seeing migrant detention as a pillar of rural survival amid declining industries.

• Privatization and Scandal:

  • Private prison companies like the Corrections Corporation of America win contracts to detain immigrants; pitch cost and speed advantages.
    • “Private prison companies… say, the jails are great, the jails are all good and fine, but we can build you new special immigrant-only facilities faster and cheaper.” — Nofil [47:19]
  • Chronic scandals (escapes, abuse, poor healthcare) drive the government back to scattering detainees among jails—a tactic to diffuse public outrage and activist attention.

• Modern System: Bipartisan Expansion & Racial Politics

  • Despite the growth of private centers, dependence on county jails never goes away—decentralization ensures a detention “footprint” in every state.
  • Immigration detention’s roots in racism and exclusion—policies consistently expand unless seen as threatening to whiteness.
    • “Immigration detention is only really ever rolled back when it is seen as threatening whiteness. And it is a system that has... gained public support by targeting racialized people.” — Nofil [50:35]
    • “This is a story about both parties coming to a consensus…that migration is criminal and that it should be punished or administered through the same infrastructure…as [the] criminal legal system.” — Nofil [53:12]

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Incentivizing Detention:
  • “Your salary as sheriff would have depended on how many people you held in the local jail.” — Brianna Nofil [10:02]
• On Legal Resistance:
  • “Almost all of them win their legal cases and leave Malone and go into the United States.” — Nofil [12:47]
• On Commodification:
  • “It is actively commoditizing people.” — Nofil [15:11]
• Local Economic Impact:
  • “One newspaper estimated that Malone would lose around $50,000 a year if, quote, Chinese business moved east. And it did.” — Rund Abdelfatah [14:42]
• On Racialized Politics:
  • “Immigration detention… is only really ever rolled back when it is seen as threatening whiteness.” — Nofil [50:35]
• Bipartisan Practice:
  • “Immigration detention is a deeply bipartisan project. This is absolutely not a story about sort of Republicans expanding it and Democrats trying to roll it back.” — Nofil [53:12]

Timestamps for Key Segments

• [00:45] — Pulteney Bigelow & the roots of administrative migrant detention
• [10:00] — Sheriffs profit directly from holding migrants
• [14:25] — The emergence of a “market” for detention contracts
• [20:17] — Ellis Island’s shift to long-term detention
• [23:26] — Eisenhower’s “humane” reform, parole vs. detention
• [25:37] — Operation Wetback and mass deportation
• [28:41] — Local backlash against federal detention centers
• [31:31] — McAllen welcomes federal detention infrastructure
• [37:07] — Oakdale & Atlanta Cuban detention uprisings
• [41:29] — Indefinite, administrative detention and its consequences
• [45:53] — Small-town Louisiana builds an economy around detention
• [47:19] — Rise of private prison companies and ongoing scandals
• [50:35] — The racial logic and durability of detention policies
• [53:12] — Both Republicans and Democrats perpetuate the detention system

Conclusion

This Throughline episode exposes the historical continuity and evolving forms of the U.S. migrant detention complex. From local sheriffs’ personal profit models and county jail “markets” to today’s decentralized network of private and public facilities, the system’s foundations are firmly entwined with economic opportunity, local survival, and racialized politics. Detention is revealed as less about managing migration effectively and more about political expediency, economic incentives, and—crucially—about who gets to be seen as an American.

For more context, tune in to the episode. The perspectives, stories, and moments of reflection—especially from historian Brianna Nofil—bring a century’s worth of history vividly to life.