The Nebraska legislature's Urban Affairs Committee hosted an interim study on the plan to transition a prison into an ICE detention center on Friday morning.

The meeting was marked by absence as much as it was marked by presence. More than 200 people crowded into the Nebraska Capitol to air their concerns, but several seats meant for the governor and agency heads remained vacant.

"So you offered and invited the governor's office to give, give testimony," Sen. John Cavanaugh asked Sen. Terrell McKinney, who runs the committee. "And they said no?"

Empty chairs, evocative of the void of information shrouding the plan to turn McCook's Work Ethic Camp into the Cornhusker Clink. It also signaled Gov. Jim Pillen's disapproval of what his office labeled a partisan hearing. Pillen's team even sa

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