Kansas tribe ends nearly $30 million deal with ICE
A. in kansas The tribe said it withdrew from a nearly $30 million federal contract to prepare preliminary designs for immigrant detention centers after facing a wave of online criticism.
Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation ‘s announcement Wednesday night came a little more than a week after economic development leaders brokered the deal with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. was fired.
While some Native Americans were captured and detained in recent ICE raids, the agreement was derided online as “disgusting” and “cruel.” Many in Indian Country also questioned how a tribe whose own ancestors were uprooted from the Great Lakes region two centuries ago and confined to a reservation south of Topeka could join the Trump administration’s mass deportation efforts.
Tribal Chairman Joseph “Zeke” Rupnick nodded to the historical issues in a video speech last week, calling the reservations “the government’s first attempts at detention centers.” In an update Wednesday, he announced that he was “pleased to share that our nation has successfully exited all third-party interests associated with ICE.”
There are a variety of businesses in Prairie Band Potawatomi that provide healthcare administration personnel, general contracting, and even interior design. And Rupnick said in his final speech that tribal officials plan to meet in January about how to ensure “economic interests do not conflict with our values in the future.”
KPB Services LLC, a tribal arm hired by ICE, was hired in April in Holton, Kansas, by Ernest C. Woodward Jr., a former naval officer who markets himself as a “go-to” consultant for tribes and affiliates seeking federal contracts. was founded by
The Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation said in 2017 that Woodward’s firm advised it to purchase Mill Creek LLC, another government contractor that specializes in outfitting federal buildings and the military with office furniture and medical equipment.
Woodward is also listed as chief operating officer. Florida Branch of Prairie Band Construction Inc., registered in September.
Attempts to find Woodward were unsuccessful. A KPB spokeswoman said Woodward was no longer with the LLC but declined to say whether he had been terminated. Woodward did not respond to an email sent to another consulting firm with which he is affiliated, Virginia-based Chinkapin Partners LLC.
A spokesperson for the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation said the tribe has withdrawn from KPB. “Prairie Band no longer has any shares,” although the company still has a contract, the spokesman said.
The spokesman said Woodward was no longer with the tribe’s limited liability company but declined to say whether he had been terminated.
The ICE contract was initially awarded in October for $19 million for unspecified “due diligence and concept designs” for processing centers and detention centers across the U.S., according to a one-sentence description of the work on the federal government’s real-time contract database. It was amended a month later to increase the payout cap to $29.9 million.
Sole source contracts over $30 million require additional justification under federal contracting rules.
Tribal leaders and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security did not respond to detailed questions about why the firm was chosen for such a large contract without having to compete for the work that federal contracts normally require. It’s also unclear what Tribal Council knew about the contract.
“This internal audit process is actually just getting started,” a tribal spokesperson said.
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Hollingsworth reported from Mission, Kansas, and Goodman reported from Miami.
