Senator Hassan opens a probe into DHS’s $495 million purchase of a Minnesota detention facility from CoreCivic

A top US Democratic senator is investigating the Trump administration’s purchase of an immigration detention facility in Minnesota from CoreCivic².

Senator Maggie Hassan sent letters to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and to CoreCivic demanding they preserve records related to the transaction⁴. Her office described the investigation as being opened amid corruption allegations¹.

Her letter states: “In 2025, DHS reportedly purchased the Prairie Correctional Facility from CoreCivic, a major immigration detention contractor, for $495 million”⁶. The letter also refers to the GEO Group, another private detention contractor¹.

The letters went both to the department that bought the facility and to the company that sold it, asking each to keep its records of the deal^1,4.

The price question

CoreCivic had offered the empty prison in Appleton, Minnesota, to the state for $75 million before selling it to Immigration and Customs Enforcement⁵. Appleton is a town of fewer than 1,400 people⁵.

CoreCivic, which did not respond to a request for comment on Thursday, has previously said DHS purchased the facility after an appraisal⁷. The company’s account of the valuation and the gap with the earlier offer to the state are the core of the inquiry^5,7.

Critics have noted that CoreCivic, which has sold multiple detention centres to DHS, contributed $500,000 to Trump’s inaugural committee³.

Taken together, the figures in the letter and the earlier offer put the federal price at more than six times what CoreCivic had sought from the state for the same property^5,6. Hassan’s demand that records be preserved signals that the transaction’s paperwork is the focus of the inquiry⁴.

Why it matters to investors

The probe is part of broader Democratic investigations into immigration policy³. Congressional scrutiny of federal deals with private detention companies adds a source of uncertainty for CoreCivic and the GEO Group, the contractors named in Hassan’s letter^1,7.

The Minnesota sale is one of several detention centres CoreCivic has sold to DHS, so questions about how prices were set could reach beyond a single facility^3,6.

What to watch

DHS and CoreCivic’s responses to Hassan’s records request, and whether the appraisal behind the purchase is made public, are the next steps^4,7. Any move by other committees to widen the inquiry to other sales would also be a marker for the sector^2,3.