The Torrance County Commission’s abrupt extension of an expired contract last month between the county, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency and private prison operator CoreCivic is “likely improper and invalid,” according to a letter the state Department of Justice sent to county officials Friday.

On Dec. 30, the three-person Torrance County Commission convened for a “special meeting” to extend an inter-governmental service agreement that enables ICE to house immigrant detainees at the Torrance County Detention Facility in Estancia. Before commissioners met, the contract had been defunct for two months.

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The contract extension to March 31 of this year increased the monthly payment ICE makes to the county to roughly $2.4 million, funding the county then passes on to CoreCivic. The parties also backdated the contract to Nov. 1, 2025, the date the original contract expired.

Immigrant legal advocates who have long called for ICE to cease housing detainees at the facility quickly raised questions about the validity of the contract extension and also whether the commission should have provided more notice to the public about the meeting between Christmas and New Year’s Day.

The contract extension also got the attention of the New Mexico Department of Justice. Spokesperson Chelsea Pitvorec told Source New Mexico earlier this week that the meeting “raises real concern regarding backdating a contract, compliance with the New Mexico procurement code, and whether the Open Meetings Act was complied with.”

On Friday, the NMDOJ alerted county officials via a letter that based on additional investigation the department conducted, the county likely violated the Open Meetings Act by failing to provide proper public notice. One instance the letter cites is that the county placed an advertisement about the meeting in local newspaper Mountainair Dispatch one day before the meeting instead of the required 72 hours.

The letter also raises questions about whether the county could legally backdate a contract, noting that retroactive acts like that typically only occur when a public body is correcting an error.

“The apparent retroactive extension of the County’s [agreement] with ICE is likely improper and invalid,” writes Blaine N. Moffatt, director of the NMDOJ’s Government Counsel and Accountability Bureau.

The letter, addressed to County Commission Chair Ryan Schwebach, asks the county to respond in a week with answers about how it publicly advertised the meeting and justified backdating the contract.

County Commission Chair Ryan Schwebach told Source New Mexico on Friday in a brief phone interview that the county did not violate the Open Meetings Act. He said the Torrance County attorney was already at work on a letter in response to the NMDOJ.

“There is not a potential violation of the Open Meetings Act,” Schwebach said. “We do not violate the Open Meetings Act,” he said.