(Tribune News Service) — Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is heading Friday to the U.S. naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where the Trump administration plans to house thousands of undocumented migrants, including some with criminal records.

A Department of Homeland Security official confirmed the trip plans to McClatchy and the Miami Herald.

On Tuesday, Homeland Security released images of “criminal aliens” preparing to board the first flight to the migrants’ detention center at the naval station. The agency said they were all members of the Tren de Aragua, a gang that originated in Venezuela.

Earlier on Tuesday, Noem had posted photos of the military flight operation with the text: “President @realdonaldtrump has been very clear: Guantanamo Bay will hold the worst of the worst. That starts today.”

The agency did not say how many people were on the flight, but CNN said it was a small group of around 10 men.

Plans to send thousands of migrants to Guantanamo are part of the mass deportations Trump promised during his campaign.

Last week he directed the departments of Homeland Security and Defense to expand the Migrant Operations Center in Guantanamo Bay “to full capacity to provide additional detention space for high-priority criminal aliens unlawfully present in the United States.” Trump mentioned he wanted to house up to 30,000 migrants, a goal that will require significant resources to expand the facility, which currently has about 200 beds.

The U.S. Southern Command, based in Doral, said Monday the Pentagon already had stationed 300 service members in Guantanamo to support the operation.

Currently, the base houses a center where migrants intercepted at sea and later declared as refugees await to be accepted in third countries.

The White House’s border czar, Tom Homan, said Immigration and Customs Protection will oversee the migrant facility. Private contractors usually manage such centers. In 2024, ICE granted Akima Infrastructure Protection a $163.4 million contract to run the migrant detention center at Guantanamo.

But few other details of the plan have been made public. CNN reported that U.S. government officials were discussing building tent facilities and Noem said the expansion wouldn’t take long.

Over 30,000 Cubans intercepted at sea during the so-called balsero crisis were held in tents between August 1994 and February 1996. The existing detention facility, a building separate from the better-known military prison, was described as dilapidated in a blistering 2024 report accusing the U.S. government of mistreating the migrants held there.

The long-term history of mistreatment accusations at the base — and even torture of 9/11 detainees — and questions around the legality of holding migrants detained in U.S. territory have been quickly cited by activists as a source of concern regarding Trump’s new plans.

Sending migrants to Guantanamo “will cut people off from lawyers, family and support systems, throwing them into a black hole so the U.S. government can continue to violate their human rights out of sight,” said Amy Fischer, director of the Refugee and Migrant Rights Program at Amnesty International USA.

But Noem has pushed back, telling NBC that there were no plans to house migrants there indefinitely and that “due process will be followed” for the migrants sent there.

©2025 Miami Herald.

Visit miamiherald.com.

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

related stories

• Buckley Space Force Base won’t house immigrant detainees, US rep says — but ICE is mum
• Hegseth meets with troops sent to border with Mexico as 150 Marines deploy to Guantanamo
• Trump picks Gov. Kristi Noem to serve as homeland security secretary