Tuesday 20 May 2025 The Independent
The astonishing figure may mean that President Donald Trump’s use of the naval base in Cuba costs almost 1,000 times more than housing people in U.S. immigration facilities
Housing migrants at Guantanamo Bay costs as much as $100,000 per inmate, per day, a U.S. senator has claimed, describing the set-up as “outrageous.”
The astonishing figure may mean that President Donald Trump’s use of the naval base in Cuba costs almost 1,000 times more than housing people in U.S. immigration facilities – which is $165.
The claims were made by Senator Gary Peters of Michigan during a hearing of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on Tuesday, in which he and other members grilled Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.
Peters, the top Democrat on the committee, decried the use of the facility as a prime example of wasteful government spending, highlighting that the Trump administration’s irrational shuttling of prisoners back and forth had also been at U.S. taxpayer expense.
“We’re spending $100,000 a day to keep someone at Guantanamo,” Peters complained. “We keep them there awhile, then we fly them back to the United States, or we could keep them here for $165 a day. I think that’s kind of outrageous.”
