Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings sent a letter to federal officials last Friday, threatening to cancel the county’s agreement with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement next month if the feds fail to renegotiate a higher reimbursement rate for the cost of detaining federal inmates in the Orange County Jail.
Under the county’s intergovernmental services agreement with ICE, negotiated through the U.S. Marshals Service, the Orange County Jail is allowed to serve as a temporary detention facility for people arrested by ICE on allegations of being in the U.S. illegally. The federal government is currently reimbursing the jail $88 for each person it holds, while county officials say the actual cost of housing a person is $180.
County officials contacted the U.S. Marshals Service six months ago, in August, to ask for a higher reimbursement rate, to offset the cost that is otherwise left to be footed by Orange County taxpayers, including people who have rallied in the streets against ICE. According to Demings, however, federal officials — while acknowledging the county’s request — have so far failed to offer a suitable reimbursement rate.
“It has been six months since our original request to renegotiate our IGSA, yet little progress has been made toward resolving this matter,” Demings wrote in a Feb. 13 letter to USMS grants specialist Aisha Ogburn. At the same time, he added, the county “continues to bear the operational and financial burden” of housing people arrested by ICE, as required under the IGSA. “The lack of your ability to offer us a fair and reasonable rate of reimbursement within an exceptionally reasonable amount of time has put Orange County in a remarkable position,” Demings wrote.
The deficit that Orange County is facing for housing ICE detainees in the Orange County Jail — i.e., the cost to local taxpayers — has “grown exponentially” since August, Demings said. Jail data presented to Orange County commissioners and Demings last week demonstrated a surge in ICE holds from October 2025 to January 2026 alone.
In January, ICE booked 1,849 people into the Orange County Jail, according to corrections data, up from 550 people in October 2025. The number of people held in the jail solely on ICE charges — and no other local charges, like a traffic infraction — increased nearly 300 percent, from 439 people in October to 1,684 people last month.
Demings earlier this month sent a similar letter to the feds, informing them that effective March 1, 2026, the jail will be limiting the number of people it will hold on behalf of ICE who are being detained for no other reason than an allegation of being in the country illegally (a civil, not criminal charge).
The jail will also refuse to rebook people who are being cycled in and out of the jail by federal immigration enforcement agents through what local immigrant rights advocates have characterized as a bad-faith loophole of the county’s agreement with ICE.
Under the county’s IGSA, Orange County Jail can hold ICE detainees for up to 72 hours before they must be moved to a different facility. In practice, federal agents have instead been taking people out of the jail and re-booking them back into the jail shortly after under a new booking number, artificially resetting the 72-hour clock.
Demings’ Feb. 13 letter states that if the USMS doesn’t “fairly resolve” reimbursement renegotiations with the county by March 13, the county will “close” negotiations and “move forward in considering options available to us” — a likely reference to legal action — as well as the termination of the county’s IGSA with ICE.
Deputy county attorney Georgiana Holmes told county leaders last week that formal claims seeking money from the U.S. government are subject to strict jurisdictional rules, and if filed, “would likely” have to be brought in the United States Court of Federal Claims in Washington, D.C.
Calls from the public locally to end collaboration with ICE altogether have ramped up since the killings of U.S. citizens Alex Pretti and Renee Good by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis last month, sparking protests involving thousands of people nationwide. Unlike some other parts of the country, however, Florida’s Republican-controlled state government has a particularly friendly relationship with ICE.
Under state law, local governments are required to demonstrate “best efforts” to support the enforcement of federal immigration law, thereby tying the hands of local officials to end collaboration or obstruct the agency’s activities. Activists locally have urged county commissioners to file a lawsuit to seek clarification from the courts on what “best efforts” actually means, since the term is not defined in state statutes.
“This isn’t just … hurting undocumented people, it’s hurting entire communities,” said Xiomary Rivera, a local hospitality union representative and U.S. citizen who told county commissioners last week that she herself had been racially profiled by law enforcement.
Demings, a Democrat and former sheriff who is running for Florida Governor this year, has punted this call to file a lawsuit, arguing the county first needs to be able to collect as much information and evidence as possible to demonstrate “best efforts” — including by begging federal officials to fully reimburse the county for doing something it is obligated to do.
“The fight is not over,” Demings argued during a board meeting last week that featured hours of discussion on the matter. “At the end of the day, we want to be in a position where, if we go into litigation, we win.”
County commissions are at the same time considering coming up with a resolution to symbolically oppose the development of a new ICE detention facility in Orlando, a possibility first reported by local media last month.
According to Bloomberg, a 440,000-square-foot industrial warehouse at 8660 Transport Drive in southeast Orlando — owned by the Atlanta-based TPA Group — is one of at least 23 warehouse sites across the U.S. that are being eyed by federal officials to develop into immigrant detention centers.
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