A once-familiar Midwest regional carrier has quietly become one of the busiest names in the federal deportation flight network, and its hangar sits right at Milwaukee Mitchell International Airport. Air Wisconsin planes have flown more than 1,350 ICE-related flights across the country so far in 2026, with the Appleton-based airline accounting for nearly half of all domestic ICE flights recorded in June alone.
The transformation traces back to January 2026, when Air Wisconsin's fleet and control of the airline were sold to CSI Aviation, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. The $110 million restructuring, which closed January 9, 2026, sent 13 Bombardier CRJ200 jets and the airline's operating certificate to CSI Aviation, while another 12 aircraft went to Associated Lease and Finance Group, according to Wisconsin Watch. CSI Aviation, headquartered in Killeen, Texas, is now the No. 1 ICE contractor in the country, per the Project on Government Oversight.
Air Wisconsin ended passenger service after its American Airlines feeder contract expired in spring 2025, laying off more than 800 workers in the process, per the same account. The carrier had tried to find a commercial buyer first — Harbor Diversified, its parent company, signed a letter of intent in mid-2025 to sell the airline to Premier Shuttle Holdings, but that deal never closed, according to SEC filings referenced by Wisconsin Watch.
A Hangar Bound by Old Rules, New Purpose
Air Wisconsin has owned its 210,000-square-foot hangar building at Milwaukee Mitchell since 2001 and pays $76,867.70 annually in rent to the airport, per the Journal Sentinel's reporting. The airline uses the site as a maintenance and crew base, and any operational changes there require airport director approval. Its lease runs through 2033 and allows only maintenance and training activity — passenger transport from Milwaukee is explicitly prohibited under the agreement.
Aviation expert William Rankin, cited in the Journal Sentinel's reporting, speculated that the hangar is used primarily for federally required maintenance and safety checks, and said Milwaukee makes sense geographically as “a logical central U.S. location for routes to the east coast and south.” Air Wisconsin planes have flown routes from Milwaukee to Ypsilanti, State College and Bedford before turning south toward destinations tied to ICE operations, and the airline advertised mechanic, inspector and cleaner positions between May and July 2026, along with a first officer job based in both Killeen and Milwaukee.
Flight Volumes Surge as Contract Value Balloons
Air Wisconsin flew 50 ICE-related flights in January 2026, a number that climbed to more than 500 by May, according to ICE Flight Monitor data cited in the Journal Sentinel's reporting. Nationwide, ICE-related flights increased 78 percent in May compared with the same period a year earlier. Air Wisconsin's own routes have concentrated heavily on a handful of destinations: planes have flown to Alexandria, Louisiana — home to a short-term staging facility for deportees — more than 700 times since January, and made Texas runs between Harlingen, Killeen and Houston more than 70 times each over the same span.
The financial windfall for CSI Aviation has been dramatic. The company's earnings grew from nearly $364 million in President Biden's last year in office to $1.23 billion in the first year of President Trump's second term, per the Project on Government Oversight. ICE originally awarded CSI Aviation a no-bid contract worth up to $128 million in February 2025, which was later modified into a 12-month agreement with a potential award value reaching $1.5 billion. CSI Aviation founder Allen Weh, his wife and his daughter contributed $460,000 to Trump's 2024 campaign, according to the same government watchdog.
Wisconsin Detainees Bused Out of State
Milwaukee-area ICE detainees are processed at the agency's downtown Milwaukee office before being transported by bus to detention centers in Illinois, Indiana and Kentucky, per the Journal Sentinel. ICE-related flights departed Milwaukee Mitchell for Richmond, Virginia, and Killeen, Texas, in late June 2026. The Department of Homeland Security said it would not discuss ongoing or future operations for security purposes.
Savi Arvey, director of policy for refugee and immigrant rights at Human Rights First, said private charter planes have created opacity around taxpayer spending and who profits from the deportation system. Her concern echoes broader reporting on how ICE increasingly relies on private charter operators like CSI Aviation to move detainees, a system that has drawn scrutiny in other cities too — Detroit officials kept ICE flights flying despite public uproar earlier this year, while activism reportedly pushed operators out of a hangar at Dallas Love Field.
Transparency Concerns Mount Nationwide
Flight-tracking has become a key tool for tracking ICE Air movements, but airlines contracted under CSI Aviation have requested that tracking websites block public visibility of their tail numbers, according to CorpWatch. Some of those aircraft have adopted the call sign “Tyson,” previously used by President Trump's personal aircraft, the outlet reported. Nationwide, ICE deportation flights exceeded 200 per month in June and July 2026 — the highest monthly totals since tracking began in 2020 — driven in part by a 123 percent surge in domestic inter-facility transfers, according to Witness at the Border.
Medical experts and human rights organizations have reported that the mandatory three-point restraint systems used on ICE charter flights, which per ICE's own handbook require detainees to be bound with handcuffs, waist chains and leg irons, can cause severe bruising, cuts, nerve damage and life-threatening blood clots during multi-hour transfers. The scale of the shift has also rattled Air Wisconsin's own workforce: after the carrier recalled furloughed flight attendants with a union-negotiated pay raise following the CSI Aviation sale, the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA reported that only about one-third chose to return.
Community backlash has followed the airline elsewhere in Wisconsin. Appleton-area breweries and other local businesses severed commercial ties with Air Wisconsin after its shift to ICE charter work, reflecting broader unease in a state where the carrier was historically headquartered. Whether that pressure — or the terms of its Milwaukee Mitchell lease — will shape the airline's future role in the deportation flight network remains an open question as flight volumes continue climbing nationwide.
