From Brennan Center for Justice:
The stock prices of the country’s two largest publicly traded companies that own and manage prisons and immigrant detention centers soared immediately following Donald Trump’s election as president. Shares in GEO Group and CoreCivic rose again the day after the president-elect announced Tom Homan, who managed immigration enforcement during Trump’s first administration, as his “border czar.” Speaking at the Republican National Convention this summer, Homan said, “I got a message to the millions of illegal aliens that Joe Biden’s released in our country. You better start packing now.”
This is not the first time prison company stocks skyrocketed at the news that Trump would take the Oval Office. When he was elected in 2016, the private prison industry — which analysts had referred to as beleaguered — immediately rebounded. Two weeks later, CNBC reported that an analyst had written in a research note, “The Trump victory was a game changer for these stocks.”
That this is a repeat phenomenon should come as no surprise. Echoing the rhetoric from his first campaign, Trump spent much of his time on the campaign trail over the past few years promising to undertake “the largest deportation operation in the history of our country.” Clearly, the incoming administration’s focus on immigration enforcement provided the confidence investors needed to bet on these stocks, which profit from government contracts for prisons and detention centers. Continue reading >>>
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