A government contractor says White House adviser Stephen Miller "wanted it to be cruel" when the administration planned to turn warehouses into immigrant detention centers.
The contractor, whose company was approached to convert several warehouses into Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities, spoke to NPR for an investigation published Thursday. He asked to remain anonymous because he feared retaliation from the government.
The Department of Homeland Security bought 11 warehouses earlier this year and spent about $1 billion on them as part of President Donald Trump's mass deportation effort, NPR reported.
"No one that we spoke to at DHS was for this idea whatsoever. The deputy director told us point-blank that they had pushed back very hard on it. Everybody knew warehouses are horrible places to put people," the contractor told NPR.
At a meeting with a DHS deputy director, the contractor said, his company proposed camps in Texas similar to those used by the Federal Emergency Management Agency that would be more humane.
The contractor said that idea was quickly shot down. Miller did not attend the meeting, but the company was told the camps were not what Miller wanted.
"Miller did not want the facilities that were comfortable. He did not want facilities that were humane. We were told point-blank that that was not what the administration wanted," the contractor said, describing what he took away from the meeting.
"Steve Miller certainly seemed to make that point to everyone that he wanted it to be cruel. This was what Miller had stated to the DHS at that time, to the DHS director and deputy director," he said.