California Moves to Extend Oversight of ICE Detention Facilities as Trump Ramps Up Mass Deportations

California is moving to lock in permanent oversight of immigration detention facilities as the Trump administration's deportation machine threatens to overwhelm a system already plagued by dangerous conditions and civil rights violations.

Attorney General Rob Bonta announced his sponsorship of Senate Bill 1399, which would eliminate the expiration date on California's detention facility inspection program. The bill, authored by Senator Maria Elena Durazo and co-sponsored by Immigrant Defense Advocates, passed out of committee this week.

Since 2017, California's Department of Justice has been required to inspect immigration detention facilities and report on conditions of confinement, standard of care, and due process protections for detained individuals. That authority was set to expire in July 2027 under the original legislation, Assembly Bill 103. SB 1399 removes that sunset provision, ensuring the inspections continue indefinitely.

The timing is not coincidental. California's most recent inspection report, released last year, identified ongoing deficiencies in the standard of care at facilities where Immigration and Customs Enforcement holds noncitizens. The report warned that inadequate conditions would only get worse as the Trump administration ramped up immigration enforcement and detention.

Those warnings are now playing out in real time. Last month, Bonta filed an amicus brief opposing conditions at the Adelanto ICE Processing Center, one of the largest immigration detention facilities in the country. He separately sent a letter to the Department of Homeland Security flagging dangerous conditions at the newly opened California City Detention Facility.

"Since the beginning of the first Trump Administration, DOJ has shined a light on the inhumane and substandard conditions at immigration detention facilities across California through rigorous inspections and periodic reports," Bonta said. "As the Trump Administration's mass deportation campaign is exacerbating existing problems at these facilities, California's reviews remain especially critical."

The inspections have documented a pattern of failures at facilities that are often run by private, for-profit companies. Detainees have faced inadequate medical care, unsafe living conditions, and violations of basic due process rights. Deaths in custody, family separations, and civil rights abuses have been documented across the detention system.

Without permanent oversight authority, California would lose the ability to independently verify conditions inside these facilities after 2027. That would leave detained immigrants and the public with no transparency into what happens behind the walls of detention centers at a time when the Trump administration is pushing to expand capacity and accelerate deportations.

"Everyone has a right to dignity, including immigrants held in detention facilities," Senator Durazo said. "SB 1399 makes sure California can keep shining a light on what happens inside these facilities, and that the public can trust that oversight will not disappear."

Immigrant Defense Advocates, which co-sponsored the bill, emphasized that transparency is a prerequisite for accountability in a system that operates largely out of public view.

"SB 1399 ensures California can continue to pull back the curtain on private, for-profit detention facilities, protecting the health and safety of our residents at a time when public oversight has never been more important," said Hamid Yazdan Panah, the organization's co-executive director.

The legislation comes as the Trump administration has made mass deportation a central policy priority. Immigration enforcement agencies are detaining more people, opening new facilities, and expanding contracts with private prison companies. Without independent state oversight, there would be little check on conditions inside those facilities or accountability when standards fall short.

California's inspection program was created in response to growing concerns about the health and safety of people in civil immigration detention. The state's reports have provided critical information to policymakers and the public about systemic problems that would otherwise remain hidden.

By removing the 2027 sunset provision, SB 1399 ensures that transparency does not have an expiration date.