American structure studio DLR Group has been linked to the conversion of an Oklahoma jail into an ICE detention centre, resulting in worker backlash and a dedication to cease work on ICE-associated services.
In response to reporting within the American journal Mom Jones, in February 2026, DLR Group workers found the studio had labored as a subcontractor for the Tennessee firm CoreCivic to transform the Diamondback Correctional Facility in Watonga, Oklahoma, right into a detention centre for US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Former DLR Group communications worker Andrew Osborne, who has now left the studio, discovered of the DLR Group’s involvement with the ability’s design, regardless of inner messaging on the contrary.
“Sufficient of a connection”
“I discovered by publicly verifiable sources that DLR Group, regardless of telling me that they have not, had continued to work with CoreCivic, and that CoreCivic has continued to lease their services to ICE,” Osborne instructed Dezeen.
“Whereas it is an oblique connection, it was sufficient of a connection for me to be very upset about it.”
A spokesperson for DLR Group, which has a longtime arm for legal justice design, confirmed its work for Diamondback Correctional Facility, including that the design work was already accomplished on the time of the revelation.
Following the worker outcry, DLR Group stated it should “not carry out work for ICE detainment or deportation services” going ahead.
DLR “is not going to carry out work for ICE” going ahead
After the publicity, DLR Group stated it hosted an “open and considerate dialogue in regards to the position of design within the present justice system”, in keeping with a DLR Group spokesperson.
“Following this dialogue, DLR Group made specific, firmwide commitments: we is not going to carry out work for ICE detainment or deportation services, nor take part in tasks that broaden services owned or operated by personal suppliers with a monetary curiosity in rising incarceration,” stated DLR Group.
DLR Group CEO Steven McKay additionally reportedly stated that the studio would donate the $300,000 in income from the Oklahoma venture, in keeping with Mom Jones.
Below the Trump Administration, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement has carried out a much-publicised spherical of immigration enforcement across the nation. The situations within the services have been questioned after reported deaths in ICE custody.
In response to the rising variety of arrests, ICE has been quietly shopping for giant, unused, usually suburban or rural services across the nation to transform into detention centres for these in custody.
A PDF detailing ICE’s Detention Reengineering Initiative was despatched to the workplace of New Hampshire Governor Kelly Ayotte, which states the conversion of services “to fulfill the rising demand for bedspace and streamline the detention and elimination course of, specializing in non-traditional services constructed particularly to assist ICE’s wants”.
In response to Bloomberg Information, firms comparable to Catastrophe Administration and Amentum have labored with ICE to remodel and handle the services.
“Jail design depends on good religion”
To Osborne, the messaging from the corporate is unclear.
“Anybody who’s in jail design is aware of that the success of that design depends on the great religion of the individuals truly working that facility,” Osborne instructed Dezeen.
“You can also make probably the most progressive design in historical past, but when the individuals working it aren’t devoted to bettering situations of incarceration and are devoted to treating individuals in custody extra humanely and attempting to primarily get them out of jail as quick as doable, then the design issues for completely nothing.
“The burden finally falls on those that are working the ability, and that is why an important consideration for any structure agency that might undertake this work is the great religion and progressive sensibility of the shopper. And there is not any cause to suppose that ICE will ever be a good-faith or progressive shopper.”
DLR Group was just lately chosen to revamp California’s San Quentin State Jail right into a rehabilitation centre following a Nordic mannequin of jail design, in keeping with the studio.
Two members of DLR Group wrote an opinion for Dezeen in 2024 detailing how “design can instantly and virtually scale back the variety of individuals in custody”
The studio says it stays dedicated to altering the way in which that design is applied within the justice system.
“DLR Group recognises that we work inside a justice system that’s not all the time equitable or simply. Our Justice+Civic studio seeks to affect change and transformation throughout these establishments. There are not any easy solutions, however our dedication is to interact thoughtfully and work towards a extra simply system,” stated DLR Group.
The photograph is by way of Google Earth.
