California DOJ staff said in a new report that they witnessed “crisis-level health care understaffing” at the CoreCivic California City Immigration Processing Center.
Stephen Lam/S.F. Chronicle
Immigrant detention centers in California were ill-prepared to handle the surge of detainees from President Donald Trump’s mass deportation crackdown, which contributed to the deaths of six people amid overcrowding and insufficient medical care, according to a new report from the California Department of Justice.
Attorney General Rob Bonta released the report on privately run immigration detention centers in California, the fifth of its kind, on Friday, which found conditions across the seven inspected facilities had largely worsened since the last set of visits in 2023. The six deaths between September and March 2026 also marked the highest number of deaths accounted for since the California DOJ began inspecting and reviewing detention centers in 2017.
“The Trump Administration’s mass deportation campaign has led to a shocking increase in detainee populations — and facilities have been alarmingly unprepared to meet this new demand,” Bonta said in a statement. “This is cruel, inhumane, and unacceptable — and it is past time for the Trump Administration to do something about it.”
Article continues below this ad
DOJ staff along with a team of correctional and health care experts toured the facilities, examined records and interviewed 194 people being held across the immigration facilities operating last year. The review found the number of detainees nearly tripled from 2,303 in 2023 to 6,028 and that Immigration and Customs Enforcement failed to meet its own standards, with prolonged intake processes that stretched onto weeks in some cases, improperly cooked food, and delayed or missing medical care, the report said.
The conditions and access to food and healthcare raise serious concerns about the facilities’ abilities to safely detain a growing population of detainees and demand greater accountability and oversight, according to Bonta’s office.
Last year, 33 people died while in ICE custody across the country. It was the highest number of deaths since the agency’s creation in 2003, federal records show. A Chronicle investigation found at least 17 people died in ICE custody since Trump took office for the second time after medical staff delayed or failed to provide critical care that may have saved their lives, according to multiple doctors who reviewed their cases.
San Francisco Chronicle Logo
Make us a Preferred Source to get more of our news when you search.
Add Preferred Source
Those findings were echoed in the California DOJ’s report, which said inspectors “learned of four deaths of detainees held at Adelanto allegedly associated with substandard medical care.” That San Bernardino processing facility’s staffing levels lagged behind the number detainees, the report said. Detainees told inspectors that they were unable to access requested medical appointments and did not receive necessary and timely treatment.
Inside Adelanto, three detainees who arrived in early June told inspectors they had to sleep on the floor of the dining room for several days without getting a medical screening or an assigned housing unit after spending the night shackled in a van. Others said they had to use trash bags as blankets.
Article continues below this ad
State inspectors found detainees at all seven facilities were consistently unable to request medical care. Across most locations, detainees with chronic and acute medical conditions did not get their needed referrals of follow-up care, the report said.
“These inspections demonstrated that civil immigration detention facilities in California are failing to meet applicable federal detention standards given the significant influx of detainees, creating worsening conditions to the detriment of detainees’ health and constitutional rights,” the report said
In California City, one of the state’s newest and largest privately run detention centers, also had inadequate healthcare infrastructure, state inspectors said. Medical intakes were sometimes done in a vacant housing pod — if they happened at all, the report said. California DOJ staff said they witnessed “crisis-level health care understaffing.” There was only one physician providing care, the report said, and the doctor did not have proper backup. The report said the facility opened before it was ready — something its operator, CoreCivic, has consistently denied.
Many held at the centers are denied bond. While the Trump administration says it has targeted criminals, most of those held in detention don’t have criminal records.
Article continues below this ad
“My office has worked tirelessly to shine a light on conditions at these facilities — and I hope this report will generate the rightful outrage and urgency necessary to improve conditions and protect detainees’ civil rights,” Bonta said.
The California DOJ said it became aware of an eighth facility, Central Valley Annex, that began to receive ICE detainees in April, while the agency was finalizing the report. The location was not part of the inspections but will be in the future. The state-mandated inspections take place every two years.