By Tim Lambert | Editor-in-chief
“All the information is so closed. We’re unable to kind of understand their tactics, the way they are acting in communities, leaving no trace behind. It’s confusing. We feel really powerless when we are not able to get the way they are working. It’s like they’re in such a low profile. It’s just like that. No information, no nothing.” — Mirna Miranda, the Pennsylvania organizing director with We Are CASA, on the lack on information surrounding an ICE raid in Danville, Montour County.
Happy Friday and a good morning to you. It looks like today and tomorrow will shape up quite nicely weather-wise, at least in central Pennsylvania. But, it appears rain is a threat for several days after that, as temps start to slide toward the 60s.
On this date in 1787 and just one day after the U.S. Constitution was signed, the Pennsylvania State Assembly received the proposed document, but did not move to ratify it. In fact, the commonwealth wouldn’t do so for nearly another three months.
Thanks for starting your day with us. As always, we deeply appreciate you reading, sharing and supporting our work. -- Tim
An Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer’s badge is seen as federal agents patrol the halls of immigration court in New York City on June 10, 2025. (Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)
By Ian Karbal
Earlier this month, immigrants’ rights advocacy groups, the Pennsylvania Immigration Coalition and the Centre County Rapid Response Network, brought attention to what they were calling the “largest ICE workplace raid in Pennsylvania to date.”
They said more than 40 construction workers — nationals from Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras and other countries — were detained in a major Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operation while leaving work building an addition on the Geisinger Medical Center campus in Danville, Montour County, on Sept. 2. Several more, they said, were arrested under similar circumstances the following week on Sept. 8.
The Capital-Star has not been able to independently verify many of the details, and has received conflicting information from police departments in the county that assisted ICE, advocates and witnesses, including a Geisinger employee and a construction worker who was there the day of the raid.
Altogether, the incident paints a picture of how difficult it can be to get timely and accurate information on ICE activity at this phase of the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign, which has gained steam since it began last year.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement headquarters in Washington, D.C., pictured in Feb. 3, 2026. (Photo by Heather Diehl/Getty Images)
By Peter Hall
Immigration rights advocates say there’s evidence the federal government plans to buy a privately owned and operated detention center in Clearfield County and are calling on Pennsylvania elected leaders to act.
The Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Decatur Township is owned by The GEO Group, a for-profit prison company that operates nearly two-dozen immigration detention centers around the country.
It has beds for about 1,800 people and has been the subject of scrutiny by members of Congress amid detainee deaths and complaints about physical and psychological abuse, a lack of adequate access to health care, and retaliation for standing up against mistreatment.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, at the time a senator from Oklahoma, speaks to reporters at the U.S. Capitol on March 3, 2026. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newroom)
By Carter Walker of Votebeat
New records provide the most detail so far about the previously opaque process by which the federal government concluded that thousands of potential noncitizens are registered to vote in Pennsylvania.
On July 16, the day President Donald Trump delivered a high-profile speech on election security, the Department of Homeland Security said it had found more than 250,000 potential noncitizens registered to vote in California, Nevada, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. The states, though, called into question the accuracy of that number and asked for more information on how it was calculated.
DHS answered Pennsylvania’s query on Sept. 9, according to an email to Secretary of the Commonwealth Al Schmidt. The department said the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ Fraud Detection and National Security Directorate identified the potential noncitizens by comparing the state’s publicly available voter roll to internal DHS databases.
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A farmer harvests soybeans Oct. 7, 2025 near Dike, Iowa. (Photo by Cami Koons/Iowa Capital Dispatch)
By Cami Koons of the Iowa Capital Dispatch
Republican members of the Senate Agriculture Committee voted Wednesday to advance a farm bill, though Democrats on the committee voted against the package due to continued disagreements on a nutrition section of the bill.
The committee marked up the bill in August, then recessed after a failed vote as Democrats held out over their proposal for an extension of when some states will have to begin paying for a share of federal nutrition benefits. Republican leadership amended the bill before the August hearing to offer a one-year extension, but Democrats continued to argue for a two-year extension.
The farm bill is typically reauthorized every five years, but the many programs under the bill have operated on various extensions of the 2018 farm bill for the past several years.
Democratic Sen. John Fetterman from Pennsylvania said the ag sector is “begging” for a new farm bill.
TODAY IN THE CAPITAL-STAR
States fight to inspect federal immigrant detention facilities: Concerned about conditions in federal immigrant detention facilities but often barred from entering them, some Democratic-led states are working to enforce their own health and safety standards at the sites.
Shifting homelessness grants toward addiction treatment, enforcement: In its latest effort to overhaul federal homelessness funding, the Trump administration is proposing to provide more money to localities that prioritize treatment-first policies such as sober living, more cooperation with law enforcement and more temporary and transitional housing.
ICYMI
Electricity supply needs to keeps pace with data center growth: Rolling blackouts would happen more than 13 days a year in a “worst case future” scenario, where data center growth is unrestrained and electricity supplies remain tight, according to a report commissioned by Pennsylvania utility regulators.
Building alone won’t fix housing shortage: Government employees and community advocates warned state lawmakers Wednesday that the commonwealth can’t build itself out of the housing shortage, but needed to also focus on preserving existing homes and keeping homes affordable for low-income Pennsylvanians.
State Treasury flagged $1.4B in improper payments: Pennsylvania’s fiscal watchdog halted about 20,000 improper state government payments worth $1.4 billion last fiscal year. State Treasurer Stacy Garrity announced details about her office’s efforts to curb waste as it processes payments for more than 70 state agencies.
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