ICE Plans 1,400-Bed Detention Center at Shuttered Rivers Correctional in Hertford County, NC

Internal ICE documents obtained by the New York Times show the agency plans to reopen GEO Group’s shuttered Rivers Correctional Institution in Hertford County, NC by the end of 2026 — North Carolina’s first dedicated ICE detention facility and one of the largest planned on the East Coast, with a target capacity of 1,400 beds. Rivers has a documented history of violence and sexual abuse; it closed in 2022 under the Biden administration’s private-prison phase-out. Governor Josh Stein opposes the reopening, but the federal government does not require state consent to operate a detention facility on federal contract. The plan is on a fast track, with contract award expected before September 2026.

Community mobilization against the reopening followed within days (2026-07-22–hertford-county-nc-rivers-correctional-geo-group-resistance), and the facility extends the same national pattern of reopening shuttered private prisons under ICE contract that the timeline has tracked at other GEO Group and CoreCivic sites through 2026’s record-pace detention expansion.