WRIGHTSTOWN. NJ (KYW Newsradio) — Two Democratic South Jersey Congress members said they're being shut out of information on Trump administration plans to house migrant detainees at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, Fort Dix.
U.S. Rep. Donald Norcross and U.S. Rep. Herb Conaway toured the Burlington County base and spoke with military base commanders Friday.
“They are as much in the dark as we are about what may happen,” Conaway said at a news conference after the tour.
A Pentagon memo approving the operation said the 42,000-acre base would be used as a migrant detention center, along with a facility in Indiana. Between 1,000 and 3,000 migrants facing deportation would be held at Joint Base MDL. Base leaders told the Congress members the operation would be run by the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, not the military.
Norcross said as a member of the Armed Services Committee, he’s been trying to learn more about the plan but has been told nothing.
“I have never in my eleven years of being in Congress has been shut out by our own government, trying to get the information on what might or might not happen on a base that happens to be in our backyard,” he said. “The idea that we can’t be brought in for homeland security...is just plain BS.”
The Congress members said they wanted to be sure that if migrants were to be held at Fort Dix, they would be treated humanely. “I don’t want to see at that detention center things that we’ve seen elsewhere," Conaway said. "I don’t want to see people living in feces and urine. I want to see the rights of women respected. I want to see people properly clothed and housed.”
The Congress members say they wanted to ensure that housing migrants would not affect the base’s military readiness.