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The grim line-up of controversial companies jostling for a shot at a $2.3 billion contract to run the Trump administration’s scandal-hit deportation scheme can be revealed by PunchUp.
Ten organizations dialed into a 45-minute virtual briefing on the upcoming Project Homecoming contract hosted by the Department of Homeland Security on Aug. 12. It marks the second installment of an earlier, $915 million deal to run the scheme that went to Salus Worldwide Solutions. That company has faced a barrage of corruption allegations over how the award process ran last year. Sources have told us that, as a result, it’s “unlikely” to win the recompete.
Draft terms for the new contract, which we revealed earlier this week, show the department wants bidders to pay unaccompanied migrant children if they “choose” to leave the country. Its menu of stipends includes the $2,500 on offer to minors since last October, with the money routed to a “Government-designated adult.” DHS will also pay the winning company to advertise the program through “trusted local networks,” hunt down eligible participants using commercial data in a practice known as skip-tracing, and set up “rover” teams that surge across the country to sign up people already in detention.