On Tuesday Texas Land Commissioner Dawn Buckingham wrote to President-Elect Donald Trump offering him the use of a 1,402-acre ranch the state acquired in October for the construction of deportation facilities.
The site, Sheerin Ranch, is located in Starr County along a bend in the Rio Grande, which divides the United States from Mexico. Situated around 35 miles west of McAllen, it is currently being used for a range of agricultural practices.
Addressing Fox News' Laura Ingraham on Wednesday, Tom Homan, a former acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) who Trump appointed as his "border czar," said the administration "absolutely will" take Buckingham up on her offer. Speaking to Newsweek the Texas General Land Office (TGLO) said the land was being offered to rent.
In her letter to Trump Buckingham said she wanted to support "the largest deportation of violent criminals in the nation's history." During a later Fox News interview she described Sheerin Ranch as "easy to build on," adding: "We figured, hey, the Trump administration probably needs some deportation facilities because we've got a lot of these violent criminals that we need to round up and get the heck out of our country."
Trump made clamping down on illegal immigration, including mass deportations of those already in the U.S., a key part of his 2024 presidential bid. On Monday, via a post on his Truth Social website, Trump indicates he plans to declare a national emergency and bring in the military to support civil authorities with deportations.
The TGLO announced it had purchased Sheerin Ranch on October 29, with Buckingham vowing to "partner with the State of Texas to secure this section of Starr County by building a fortified 1.5-mile wall."
Newsweek has included two maps showing birds-eye views of Sheerin Ranch, alongside with the Rio Grande and other surrounding countryside.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott announced plans to build a wall along the Texas-Mexico border in June 2021, though as of July 2024 only 34 miles of bollards had been constructed along the 1,254-mile border.
In the purchase press release Buckingham added: "For too long, the federal government has abdicated its job to secure our southern border – endangering Texans by allowing hundreds of thousands of unvetted illegal migrants to stream across our porous border."
According to the TGLO Sheerin Ranch, which exists besides a bend in the Rio Grande, is "currently a row crop farm that produces many industry staples, including onions, canola, sunflowers, grain sorghum, corn, cotton, and soybeans."
On Wednesday Homan addressed claims some Democratic controlled "sanctuary states" could refuse to cooperate with Trump's deportation agenda.
He said: "Sanctuary states said they're not allowing any detention facilities in their state—fine. Then we'll arrest them. We'll fly them out of the state and detain them outside the state, again, away from their families, their attorneys...You're not going to stop us doing what we're going to do."
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