Immigration Detention and Private Prisons

The Supreme Court unanimously refused GEO Group’s bid for an immediate appeal in a Colorado lawsuit alleging the private ICE contractor forced immigrant detainees to clean common areas for $1 a day, a denial the court described as a procedural defeat rather than a ruling on the merits. GEO had argued it is immune from suit as a federal contractor after a trial judge rejected that defense; the company—which manages or owns about 77,000 beds across 98 facilities and recently obtained a contract for a Newark immigration center—also faces a separate Washington state judgment ordering it to pay more than $23 million over similar detainee‑labor practices.

The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled Wednesday that private prison operator GEO Group cannot immediately appeal a trial judge’s refusal to dismiss a lawsuit alleging that immigration detainees at its Aurora, Colorado facility were coerced into janitorial and other work for as little as $1 a day. The justices did not decide whether GEO is ultimately liable, but they rejected the company’s argument that, as a federal contractor claiming immunity, it was entitled to an automatic, fast‑track appeal of the adverse ruling. The underlying 2014 suit, similar to cases GEO has faced elsewhere, accuses the firm of forcing detainees to clean housing units and perform other tasks to supplement inadequate food, practices the company defends as lawful and voluntary. GEO, one of the nation’s largest private detention providers with about 77,000 beds at 98 facilities, has already been hit with a more than $23 million judgment in a related Washington state case over its $1‑a‑day program. By foreclosing this shortcut appeal, the Court’s decision keeps the Colorado case alive and signals that other government contractors running immigration detention centers will have a harder time using immunity claims to delay forced‑labor litigation before it reaches trial.