Closed Capital Region Airport Commission meeting focuses on ICE flights from RIC
In an unusually long, closed-door session Oct. 27, the Capital Region Airport Commission discussed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement flights departing from Richmond International Airport.
For an hour, RIC General Counsel Warren David Harless addressed the 14-member body made up of elected and non-elected officials representing the city of Richmond and the counties of Henrico, Hanover and Chesterfield.
When the doors to the public meeting opened, RIC President and CEO Perry Miller first focused on positive news of a planned off-site childcare center and then asked Harless to give a public update to the board and observers on the ICE flights, phrasing it as a regulatory matter.
Regulations and federal actions
Miller said he knew that some CRAC members had received inquiries about the ICE flights as a result of news articles. The presentation, he said, would inform the CRAC members about what the airport has been doing but not its position on the topic.
Harless last reported to the commission about ICE flights a year ago, he said, and an update was warranted because there have been some changes, though the legal conclusions are the same.
“The commission cannot prohibit ICE operations at the Richmond International Airport,” Harless said. “The commission cannot regulate or restrict ICE operations if the regulation or restriction is tailored to ICE and not other users of the airport. In other words, any restriction we impose must be imposed across the board for all users of the airport.”
Harless also said the Capital Region Airport Commission cannot legally regulate or restrict ICE.
“The practical effect of the regulation or restriction is to prevent or interfere with the activities ICE operations at the airport,” Harless said citing three sources.
“The deed that granted to us the land upon which to operate this airport requires that we give federal government unrestricted access to its operations. The second thing is that annually, five or six times annually, we sign grant agreements whereby the federal government funds the operation of construction here at the airport, wherein we promise the federal government that they have unrestricted access to the airport, and finally, there's a supremacy clause of the United States Constitution, which prevents us from undertaking any action that would interfere with federal operations on the airport.”
Harless said the Federal Aviation Administration has taken disciplinary, punitive actions against airports that have engaged in actions that restrict ICE operations.
“Thus far, those legal actions have been successful, at least for the federal government,” Harless said. “Ultimately the FAA would be the party that would determine whether or not the Richmond International Airport is engaged in activities that violate the various covenants that it has with the federal government, and that would not be within the court system, particularly under grant assurances.”
Harless said he is engaged with a group of counsel nationally to understand what is going on at other airports, “what is or is not effective.”
He did not elaborate on that idea further. The CRAC meeting then focused on other airport business matters.
Harless and Miller would not comment afterwards about the closed-session discussion or about why it was held.
Henrico Supervisor Rev. Tyrone Nelson, who represents the Varina District (where the airport is located), was not present at the meeting.
Henrico supervisors Rev. Roscoe Cooper (who represents Fairfield District) and Misty Roundtree (who represents the Three Chopt District) were in attendance.
Roundtree messaged the Citizen she could not comment on the substance of the closed meeting but confirmed that it focused on legal guidance about ICE flights and applicable laws and court decisions confirming the airport's inability to bar the flights from occurring.
RIC has witnessed more than 150 ICE flights this year
While the ICE flights have been in operation for years at RIC, several CRAC board members representing Henrico County told the Henrico Citizen last fall that they had not been informed of the operations or the increased activity since 2024.
Organizations like Human Rights First have raised alarms about human rights abuses surrounding ICE flights, specifically since the Trump administration has pursued an unprecedented mass deportation agenda, dedicating $85 billion to the effort.
In its latest ICE Flight Monitor report for September, which was released last Monday, HRF raised concerns that the ICE shuffle flights are a part of a concerning “range of new tactics, many of which are unlawful, and undoubtedly cruel, to achieve this objective, including expanding the use of expedited removal, sending people from the United States to offshore detention facilities at the U.S. Naval Base in Guantanamo Bay, terminating protected legal statuses, disappearing people without due process, ramping up interior enforcement, and forcibly transferring individuals to other countries of which they are not citizens, where they have experienced grave human rights abuses.”
The D.C.-Maryland-Virginia region has also seen a dramatic rise in domestic shuffle flights, with Washington D.C.; Richmond, Virginia; and Baltimore, Maryland, together seeing an increase of more than 300% compared to 2024, according to the latest HRF report.
The ICE Flight Monitor September report counted a total of 50 ICE deportation flights from RIC in 2024, an increase to 128 in 2025 and 154 so far this year. The report stated that RIC has more than three ICE flights per week, with Key Lime being the most likely airline to fly detainees from RIC to an Alexandria, Louisiana deportation hub as well as to detention sites in Harlingen and Killeen, Texas.
In 2026, Key Lime made a high of 265 immigration enforcement flights around the country in January. Last month, the number of immigration enforcement flights Key Lime flew around the U.S. totaled 173, according to HRF, which listed a total of 12 airlines contracted by ICE to run domestic shuffle and international deportation flights.
HRF named Richmond airport as one of the country’s top 10 domestic transfer locations in September 2026.
Activists’ concerns
While the CRAC meetings are open to the public as a publicly funded body that was initiated by the Virginia General Assembly in 1975, no identified general law requires an open-microphone comment period at every regular meeting. Unlike many other local bodies, the CRAC does not provide meeting recordings or streaming, measures that would allow those who cannot attend a meeting to view the actions and discussion.
Three area activists present at the meeting wore t-shirts publicizing affiliations and concerns.
Paul Fleisher, a Varina resident who has seen detained, shackled people loaded onto numerous flights, objected to the ICE deportation flights at RIC because of his concerns about the inhumane treatment of residents and the resulting separation of family members, some of whom are citizens.
Janet Eddy, another activist at the CRAC meeting who is a retired physician, said she has grave concerns regarding the physical and legal welfare of people on deportation flights, highlighting medical risks associated with the use of full-body restraint wraps on detainees.
Fleisher said he believes deportations have a negative economic impact due to the loss of labor in critical sectors such as agriculture, construction and service industries.
He is also concerned because of the lack of transparency, noting that flight loading and unloading has been moved to remote areas of the airport, in his estimation to avoid public view.
He, and Eddy, who are both members of the activist group Indivisible, suggested several ways for the CRAC to address the deportation flights the activists view as unethical, immoral and illegal. Chiefly, they would like CRAC to issue a public statement expressing disapproval or stating the commission finds the situation unfair.
They also would like the commission to conduct site visits of the deportation flights to observe the loading and unloading process and speak directly with Department of Homeland Security personnel and detainees. Eddy suggested installing cameras available to the public so that lawyers and family members may possibly figure out where their loved ones are being taken.
Eddy and Fleisher said they felt that continuing to attend CRAC meetings and discussing their concerns with decision makers connected to the airport – including the Fixed Base Operator Richmond Jet Center, which supplies fuel to the planes – is important to hold leaders accountable.
A Richmond Jet Center staffer told Eddy outside the CRAC closed session when she approached them to explain her concerns that the business views the deportation flights as aircraft that need to be fueled and does not get involved, cutting the conversation short.
A CRAC member who Eddy approached after the meeting to express her concerns told her that commission members were not permitted to speak about the matter.
“It’s disappointing that they feel like their hands are tied,” Fleisher said. “There are a number of things they can do to make it clear that they don’t approve of what the Homeland Security is doing, starting with making a public statement. I’d love to hear them say, ‘We wish that this was not happening at the airport. We don’t believe it is fair or right. Unfortunately, there’s nothing we can do about it.’”
He said he wants more members of the public to know about the deportation flights at RIC and what he believes is the unjust treatment of the people detained.
“I would hope that members of the public would express their disapproval to the airport commission and to their county officials, and I would also like them to know that this is only a part of the effort underway by DHS to remove hardworking people from our communities,” Fleisher said.
Dina Weinstein is the Citizen’s community vitality reporter and a Report for America corps member, covering housing, health and transportation. Support her work and articles like this one by making a contribution to the Citizen.
