by the Justice Department over whether he

to speed up the closure, citingthere along with stabbings, suicides and even one homicide.

But with President Donald Trump pushing for mass deportations under a wide-ranging crackdown on illegal immigration, the facility that CoreCivic now calls the Midwest Regional Reception Center is in demand again. It is located just 10 miles (16 kilometers) west of the Kansas City International Airport. As part of his crackdown, Trump has vowed to sharply increase detention beds nationwide from the budgeted 41,000 beds this year.Tennessee-based CoreCivic initially applied for a special use permit from the city in February but then withdrew that application the next month, arguing in court filings that it didn’t need the permit and that the process would take too long.“It became clear to CoreCivic that there was not a cooperative relationship,” said Taylor Concannon Hausmann, an attorney for the private prison operator, speaking in court.

The city sued CoreCivic, the lawsuit claiming that CoreCivic impeded the city police force’s ability to investigate sexual assaults and other violent crimes. The lawsuit contended that the permitting process was needed to safeguard itself from future problems.“Just follow our rules,” an attorney for the city, Joe Hatley, said in court. “Go get a permit.”

The first version of the lawsuit, filed in March in federal court, was tossed out in May on technical grounds. But Bryant sided with Hatley in the case refiled the same month in state court, finding that the proper procedures weren’t followed.

Concannon Hausmann, CoreCivic’s attorney, declined to comment as the crowd filtered out of the courtroom Wednesday. Norman Mallicoat held a sign reading, “CoreCivic Doesn’t Run Leavenworth” as he left.Steel prices have already climbed 16% since Trump became president in mid-January, according to the government’s Producer Price Index. And as of March 2025, steel cost $984 a metric ton in the U.S., significantly higher than than in Europe ($690) or China ($392), per the U.S. Commerce Department.

As part of trade deal reached on May 8, the U.K. said that the U.S.to exempt the country from its then-universal 25% duties, which would allow British steel and aluminum to come into the U.S. duty-free. That has yet to happen. But in his proclamation issued Tuesday, Trump acknowledged that it was “necessary and appropriate” to implement the deal.

The duty on British steel and aluminum will now stay at 25% instead of zero. But that rate could go up starting on July 9 if the U.S. government determines that Britain has not held up its end of the bargain, the details of which remain unclear.British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has said that he is confident a trade deal exempting the U.K. from U.S. metals tariffs entirely will be in force before Trump’s July 9 deadline.