Prison giant sued to gain access to files

Federal contractor denies donation to Trump PAC violated any ban

The Campaign Legal Center filed a lawsuit Thursday seeking to force the Department of Justice to release records to determine whether GEO Group, a massive forprofit prison company, used illegal campaign contributions to persuade the Trump administration to reverse a proposed phaseout of lucrative private federal prison contracts.

Lawyers for the nonprofit say they are seeking information to determine whether $225,000 in campaign contributions made by a subsidiary of the Florida-based private-prison giant GEO Group to a Trump super PAC played a role in several recent government contracting decisions that benefited the company. It has further alleged those contributions violated a ban on federal contractor contributions.

A spokesman for GEO group, Pablo Paez, has denied that $225,000 in donations made by its subsidiary — GEO Corrections Holdings Inc. — last year to the pro-Trump super PAC were illegal or related directly to government contracting policy announcements.

“These are absolutely baseless and meritless allegations. All of our company’s contributions have been fully compliant with all applicable laws,” Paez said in an email.

GEO Group, based in Florida, is one of the nation’s largest for-profit prison companies. It runs 74 detention facilities nationwide with 80,000 beds and describes itself as the “fifth largest correctional system in the United States,” according to its website. GEO Group reported $2.18 billion in total revenues in its

2016 annual report. Since Trump won the election, its stock price has doubled.

GEO runs several detention centers and prisons in Texas — including a 1,500bed immigration detention facility in Conroe. In April, GEO announced that it received the largest contract so far awarded by the Department of Homeland Security under ICE to build a second $100 million dollar facility in Conroe where another 1,000 immigrant detainees will be held under a 10-year, $400 million government contract.

Paez noted that the Conroe contract came from the Department of Homeland Security, not the Department of Justice, as “part of a competitive procurement process which was initiated by the Obama Administration in 2015.”

But the Department of Justice does oversee other contracts held by GEO under the Federal Bureau of Prisons, including two contracts in Big Spring that were recently renewed under the Trump Administration.

Paez argued that the Trump administration’s policy reversal by the Department of Justice for BOP contracts merely “reinstated the long-standing policy and practice enabling the use of publicprivate partnerships by the Federal Bureau of Prisons, which has been in place since the 1990s under both Democratic and Republican Administrations.”

The Washington D.C.based nonprofit, a nonpartisan organization that focuses on the financing of campaigns, filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia after getting no immediate response to its related Freedom of Information Act request on government contracting decisions involving GEO Group. The government has not yet filed its response to the lawsuit.

In August 2016, a DOJ Inspector General report concluded that private contract prisons had “more safety and security incidents per capita” than government-owned prisons, and the Obama administration subsequently announced it would phase out federal prison contracts like those held by GEO Group. That decision would have affected BOP contracts; DHS contracts with GEO continued.

The lawsuit filed Thursday alleges that on Aug. 19, 2016, one day after the Obama administration announced its decision, the company made a $100,000 donation to the pro-Trump super PAC Rebuilding America Now through its subsidiary GEO Corrections Holdings Inc.

The nonprofit filed a complaint in November with the Federal Elections Commission arguing that the $100,000 corporate contribution violated a 75-year-old federal law that bans federal contractors from making political contributions. The same day, GEO Corrections Holding Inc. contributed an additional $125,00 to Rebuilding America Now.

GEO Corrections Holding Inc. is a wholly-owned subsidiary that shares the same address as GEO Group.

The FEC complaint about the alleged illegal contractor contributions remains pending.

Marie D. De Jesús / Houston Chronicle Douglas Menjivar, who says he was twice attacked at Joe Corley Detention Facility, protests outside the center, which is operated by the GEO Group.

Marie D. De Jesús / Houston Chronicle Douglas Menjivar, left, who was kept in the Joe Corley Detention Facility for two years, joins protestors who allege human rights abuse takes place at the center.