A police supply company in the Bangor area has a contract worth hundreds of thousands of dollars to outfit a growing number of immigration enforcement agents with leather credential holders.
The small Penobscot County town of Corinna is home to Perfect Fit, a manufacturer of leather goods and badge holders for police departments that also holds naming rights to the local community center. It has been a government contractor for years and has received orders from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement going back to 2008.
But the small Maine business got a boost last year after President Donald Trump and the Republican-led Congress added $170 billion over four years for immigration enforcement and authorized the hiring of 10,000 more agents. It’s a notable example of a business here benefiting from the national enforcement surge that focused on Maine last month.
In September, Perfect Fit got a contract for more than $375,000 to provide leather credential wallets and shield badge holders “for new ICE law enforcement officers.” That’s a more than seven-fold increase over its typical annual awards from the Department of Homeland Security, which had been generally hovering around $50,000 per year.
Company owner Mike Lebel declined comment. The Bangor Daily News profiled his company in 2012 for making wallets with the ability to block “skimmers” from stealing credit card information. It also has made badge wallets for Hollywood, including the legendary Fox thriller “24.”
The company is a small one, saying it had 30 employees in a 2015 catalog. It also makes holders for other police equipment, including handcuffs, flashlights and radios. A 2023 contract awarded Perfect Fit over $812,000 for badge holders used by the federal prison system.
It’s not clear what impact the cash will have on Perfect Fit’s business. In a video released by First National Bank last year, Label said the company lost 50% of business early in the COVID-19 pandemic but quickly saw business pick back up following financial help from the bank because of its unique domestic manufacturing capability.
“We pride [ourselves] on making an American product for our heroes that are putting their lives on the line every day,” he said then.
