Utah News Dispatch
Hundreds demand ‘ICE out’ of Salt Lake warehouse set to become detention center
Sherri Vance joins a protest outside a planned ICE detention facility in Salt Lake City on Wednesday, March 18, 2026. (Photo by Spenser Heaps for Utah News Dispatch)
Chanting “ICE out!” hundreds of protesters gathered Wednesday night outside a Salt Lake City warehouse now under ownership of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. They sang, cheered and condemned its planned transformation into a detention center after ICE bought the facility for $145.4 million.
Chants were occasionally drowned out by the rumble of large trucks, including UPS semitrailers, some honking in support as they passed through the sea of warehouses. The energetic event had some tense turns but stayed mostly peaceful.
Speakers urged elected officials ranging from city leaders to Utah’s congressional delegation to fight the project. Several spoke of inspiration from Minneapolis, where protesters rallied to oppose ICE’s sustained presence and operations in that city for about two months ending in February.
“We need to show that everyday people can fight back, and we can win,” said Vero Martinez with the Salt Lake branch of the Party for Socialism and Liberation.
The Rev. Monica Dobbins, of the First Unitarian Church of Salt Lake City, said the detention center harkens to Utah’s history as the site of the Topaz internment camp during World War II, when President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed an executive order sending 120,000 Japanese immigrants and Japanese-Americans into internment; 11,000 were held at Topaz.
“They’re going to create a Topaz 2.0,” Dobbins said, with several in the group shouting “Shame!” in response.
As the protest wound down, a scuffle broke out between some protesters and two people who appeared to be federal law enforcement agents. Some demonstrators who had broken off from the larger group threw rocks at the warehouse building’s dark glass windows. A structure outside the building was also vandalized with a spray paint message “Kill all Nazis” and a swastika with a red circle and line through it.
An officer wearing an ICE badge and a uniform that said “Police ERO” — short for the agency’s enforcement and removal operations arm — could be seen holding open one of the building’s front doors, with white paint on his neck. One demonstrator with a hand partially covered in white paint appeared to have fallen or been pulled to the ground. It wasn’t immediately clear if that person was detained by any law enforcement agency. At other moments, arguments broke out between the protesters themselves.
Little is known about the company that sold the facility to ICE last week for $145.4 million. The seller, RREEF CPIF 6020 W 300 S LLC, is a Delaware limited liability company with an address in Chicago, property records show. The documents don’t make clear who runs the company or how the deal came together.
Both Democratic and Republican officials have raised concerns about the process. Sen. John Curtis, R-Utah, has been vocal about the deal, criticizing what he called “back-door negotiations” and emphasizing that local leaders didn’t get a seat at the table.
Utah’s Democratic state lawmakers and the mayors of Salt Lake City and Salt Lake County condemned the plan as inhumane and not feasible for an industrial facility designed to house goods, not people.
In a statement to Utah News Dispatch on Friday, ICE described the warehouse’s future as “very well-structured detention facilities meeting our regular detention standards.”
ICE said its sites undergo community impact studies and “a rigorous due diligence process to make sure there is no hardship on local utilities or infrastructure prior to purchase,” but did not provide details or findings of any such reviews. The agency said the project would make the surrounding community safer, a sentiment echoed by Rep. Matt MacPherson, the Republican from West Valley City whose district includes the warehouse location.
On Wednesday night, protesters holding American flags and homemade signs disagreed. Olga Gallardo, 32, of West Jordan, held a hand-painted sign saying, “it’s a beautiful day to melt some ICE.” Gallardo said her connection to the experience of immigrants and the sacrifices they make is personal. She fought emotion as she described how her parents moved to the U.S. from the central Mexican state of Aguascalientes long ago in search of better opportunities.
“They gave up so many things, you know? And they did it with the purpose of making sure that their kids would be better off than they were,” Gallardo told Utah News Dispatch.
After more than an hour of chants and banner waving, the crowd thinned until a handful of protesters remained, including a group that retreated to the curb when officers in tactical helmets and Salt Lake City patrol cars warned them to back off. Officers detained one person after someone ran across the property.
