Random House

A tiny firm scored a $1.3 billion deal—and became symbolic of the feds' opaque detention push.

- Samantha Michaels

WHEN THE TRUMP administration awarded a $1.

26 billion contract this summer to build and operate a new tent city detention center in Texas, it made headlines, and not just because the facility, located at the Fort Bliss Army base, was expected to be the biggest of its kind in the country. The company that won the job, Acquisition Logistics, was so small it operated out of a single-family home in Richmond, Virginia. Almost nobody had heard of it. “A random house...just won $1.26 billion from ICE,” wrote the New Republic.

Whereas many companies with ICE contracts had long histories with immigrant detention, including private prison giants such as GEO Group, Acquisition Logistics had no prior experience in incarceration. Previously, its biggest federal contract was $16 million, and CEO Ken Wagner is circling retirement at 77. Over the summer, the company's website was inaccessible to the public, with the header “Site maintenance in progress.” Archived screenshots showed the firm specializes in supply chain management. Could it safely operate a 5,000-bed detention facility?