The findings come from Dr. Muthusamy Anandkumar, who was assigned by a judge to oversee medical conditions at the California City Immigration Processing Center, a sprawling facility about 75 miles east of Bakersfield operated by private prison company CoreCivic. The federal government purchased the site earlier this month, though CoreCivic continues to run day-to-day operations.

Anandkumar was appointed in March as part of an ongoing lawsuit filed by seven detainees who argue that conditions inside the facility amount to a violation of their due process rights.

In his report, Anandkumar wrote that the center “lacks a reliable system for consistently providing adequate medical care, placing individuals at serious risk of both immediate and long-term harm.” He added that the pattern of failures points to systemic problems within the facility’s health care operations rather than isolated lapses.

The doctor was careful to note that individual health care workers were not to blame. Instead, he pointed to understaffing, weak management and insufficient oversight as the root causes. At times, he found, staff members were pulled out of ongoing training sessions to cover shifts because the facility was short-handed.

“As a result, employees who had not completed their own training were, in turn, training new hires,” Anandkumar wrote. “Given the number of patients and the seriousness of their medical and mental health needs, these significant shortcomings contribute to an unsafe environment.”

The monitor identified 13 separate deficiencies within CoreCivic’s medical program at the California City site, including inadequate emergency response, insufficient dental care and poor management of chronic illnesses. He also found that detainees were not given timely access to prescribed medications.

ICE opened the detention center on the grounds of a shuttered state prison and began housing detainees there in August. Just a month later, Disability Rights California, a state advocacy organization, conducted a two-day inspection of the facility and reported that staff were failing to distribute medication for potentially life-threatening conditions and were not scheduling necessary surgeries in a timely manner.

That inspection’s findings closely mirror what Anandkumar documented ten months later, including delayed responses to urgent medical requests and failure to distribute medication for conditions requiring ongoing management, such as diabetes, high blood pressure and seizure disorders.

A CoreCivic spokesperson said the facility offers daily access to physical and mental health services, along with round-the-clock emergency medical care.

“When specialized or advanced care is required beyond what is available on-site, our medical staff coordinates with community physicians, hospitals and specialty providers to facilitate access to medically necessary treatment,” said Ryan Gustin, a CoreCivic spokesperson. “While we work diligently to arrange and facilitate those appointments, the scheduling, availability and capacity of outside providers are not something the facility controls.”

Gustin added that an ICE compliance officer monitors adherence to detention standards at the facility.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California on behalf of detainees held at the site, alleges that people in custody lack sufficient clothing to withstand cold desert nights and are being denied medical care for life-threatening conditions. The complaint also states that detainees with mobility impairments have been denied wheelchairs, with some unable to bathe or dress themselves without assistance.

Sokhean Keo, one of the detainees named as a plaintiff in the case against ICE, said in a statement distributed by the ACLU that he never received medication prescribed to treat an infection.

“If this system isn’t changed,” Keo said, “sick people are going to die.”

Original source: CalMatters

The post Judge Sends Doctor to Inspect California’s Largest ICE Detention Facility — Here’s What He Found appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

Dr. Muthusamy Anandkumar, who was assigned by a judge to inspect conditions at the California City Immigration Processing Center, concluded that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is not providing detainees with adequate medical care. His report describes detainees going without prescribed medications and waiting months for cancer treatment at the facility, located roughly 75 miles east of Bakersfield.

The center is operated by CoreCivic, a private prison contractor. The federal government bought the property earlier this month, though CoreCivic continues to run day-to-day operations there.

Anandkumar’s appointment stems from a lawsuit filed by seven detainees who argue that conditions inside the facility violate their constitutional right to due process. A federal judge named him as an independent monitor in March to assess the situation firsthand.

In his findings, Anandkumar wrote that the facility “lacks a reliable system to consistently provide adequate health care, placing individuals at serious risk of both immediate and long-term harm.” He added that the pattern of problems pointed to systemic breakdowns in how healthcare is delivered, rather than isolated incidents.

According to the report, the shortcomings are not the fault of individual medical staff but stem from deeper issues with staffing levels, management and oversight. Anandkumar noted that employees were sometimes pulled from training sessions to fill gaps in coverage caused by staff shortages — meaning workers who had not completed their own training were left to instruct incoming employees.

“Given the number of patients and the seriousness of their medical and mental health needs, these substantial gaps contribute to an unsafe environment,” he wrote.

The monitor identified 13 separate areas of concern within CoreCivic’s healthcare operations, including shortcomings in emergency response, dental services and the management of chronic illnesses. He also found that detainees were not getting timely access to medications they had been prescribed.

ICE began housing detainees at the site — a former state prison — in August. The following month, the advocacy group Disability Rights California conducted its own two-day review of the facility and reported similarly troubling findings, including failures to provide medication for life-threatening conditions and delays in scheduling necessary surgeries.

The overlap between that September inspection and Anandkumar’s report, issued roughly ten months later, is notable. Both documented slow responses to urgent medical requests and lapses in distributing medication needed to manage conditions such as diabetes, high blood pressure and seizure disorders.

CoreCivic spokesperson Ryan Gustin defended the facility’s healthcare operations, saying detainees have daily access to physical and mental health services and that emergency medical care is available around the clock. He said that when specialized treatment is needed beyond what’s available on-site, facility staff work to coordinate care with outside hospitals and physicians — though he noted that scheduling and provider availability are ultimately outside the facility’s control.

Gustin added that compliance with detention standards is monitored by an ICE compliance officer assigned to the facility.

The underlying lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, raises additional concerns beyond medical care. Plaintiffs allege that detainees lack adequate clothing to withstand cold desert nights and that some with mobility impairments have been denied wheelchairs, leaving them unable to bathe or dress themselves without assistance.

Among the plaintiffs is Sokhean Keo, a detainee at the facility, who said in a statement released through the ACLU that he never received medication prescribed to treat an infection.

“If there is no change to this system,” Keo said, “sick people are going to die.”

Original source: CalMatters

The post Doctor’s Inspection of California’s Largest ICE Detention Facility Reveals Troubling Conditions, Court-Ordered Report Shows appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

The Department of Homeland Security has agreed to buy the Otay Mesa Detention Center in San Diego County and the California City Detention Center in Kern County from CoreCivic, the private prison company that has operated both sites, in a deal valued at $1.5 billion. According to federal officials, the purchase is a direct response to years of pushback from Sacramento aimed at curbing the expansion — and even the existence — of ICE detention facilities within state lines.

ICE spokesperson Jason Sweeney said the two facilities are essential to maintaining the agency’s detention network along the West Coast. Unlike states such as Florida and Oklahoma, he said, California offers ICE little cooperation from state and local governments in securing detention space.

“Politicians who champion the state’s sanctuary stance keep pushing laws to ban or financially cripple private prisons,” Sweeney said.

The standoff dates back to Trump’s first term, when Democratic lawmakers in Sacramento moved quickly to blunt the administration’s immigration enforcement push. In 2019, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed legislation intended to phase out private, for-profit prisons and immigration detention centers in California by 2028. CoreCivic rival GEO Group, along with the federal government, sued, arguing the law violated the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause by improperly interfering with federal authority. They won, and in 2022 the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the state’s ban on privately run immigration detention centers.

Since then, state lawmakers have tried other approaches, including proposals to impose steep taxes on private detention operators to make them financially unsustainable.

The property sale comes as California Attorney General Rob Bonta continues to battle the Trump administration over a separate, contested ICE facility being built near Gilroy, a onetime farming community south of San Jose that has grown into a city of about 60,000 surrounded by garlic fields and vineyards. The state contends the land has been zoned exclusively for agricultural use since 1967.

“ICE’s plans to build a facility near Gilroy violate multiple federal laws,” Bonta said, arguing the agency failed to conduct required environmental reviews before construction began.

Federal contracting records show the U.S. General Services Administration signed a 20-year lease in 2025 with Beverly Hills-based ECG 6 LLC for the Gilroy property, valued at $26.5 million. In July, federal officials agreed to pause construction on the 26-acre site while litigation proceeds.

California officials, meanwhile, have leaned on another law from Trump’s first term to demand access to inspect detention facilities. In December, Bonta sent a letter to the Department of Homeland Security citing “dangerous and inadequate living conditions” at the California City facility. In San Diego County, local health inspectors remain locked in a legal dispute with CoreCivic over access to inspect the Otay Mesa center.

Claire Trickler-McNulty, a former senior ICE official during the Biden administration, said selling the properties outright to the federal government will likely shield them from California’s health and safety inspection authority.

“It gives them protection from state and local laws, especially when it comes to zoning rules and environmental requirements,” Trickler-McNulty said.

A shift in strategy

A year ago, President Trump signed a sweeping spending package that dramatically boosted funding for immigration enforcement, allocating $45 billion to ICE for detention capacity. The agency initially planned to build new detention centers across the country.

According to Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior researcher with the American Immigration Council, the purchase of Otay Mesa and California City signals a notable departure from that earlier plan, known as the ICE Detention Facility Reengineering Initiative. Unveiled in early 2026, that blueprint called for converting warehouses into massive detention complexes capable of holding between 7,500 and 10,000 people each — facilities larger than any built in the United States since the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II.

Reichlin-Melnick described the overall detention system as one that was never carefully designed. Todd Lyons, ICE’s then-acting director, told attendees at the 2025 Border Security Expo in Phoenix that he wanted deportations to run “like Amazon Prime, but with human beings.”

“At no point did anyone sit down and thoughtfully design the ‘Amazon Prime for human beings,’” Reichlin-Melnick said.

That warehouse-conversion initiative has largely stalled, undone by lawsuits, an unrealistic timeline, and a nationwide shortage of correctional staff and medical workers, he said. But the billions in earmarked funding still need to be spent before it expires.

“We expect them to buy other facilities,” Reichlin-Melnick said.

A former senior Homeland Security official suggested conditions for detainees could actually improve under direct federal ownership.

“It might be better for ICE to take over a proper facility than to use warehouses, house people in makeshift facilities, or rely on centers run by private companies,” the former official said.

Purchase prices far exceed assessed value

County assessor records show the federal government paid well above market value for both properties. In San Diego County, the Otay Mesa facility carries an assessed value of $164.9 million for the current fiscal year — yet DHS paid $739.2 million, roughly 4.5 times that figure. In Kern County, the California City facility was assessed at $171.5 million, while DHS paid $732.6 million, about 4.3 times its assessed worth.

A former senior ICE official, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly, questioned whether the price tag matches actual security needs. “$1.5 billion just for the facilities? How many migrants who pose a real threat to national and public safety are going to move through there? And what about the people we actually need to keep off the streets?” the former official asked.

Anthony Martinez, a spokesperson for Gov. Newsom, called the administration’s deportation agenda “a reckless and cruel use of taxpayer money,” accusing federal officials of funneling billions to private contractors while avoiding transparency about conditions inside the facilities.

San Diego County Supervisor Paloma Aguirre drew a direct line between the sale and CoreCivic’s political spending, pointing to the company’s $500,000 donation to Trump’s inaugural committee. That contribution, she said, preceded what she called a “multibillion-dollar taxpayer-funded windfall” that will help the company pay down debt while allowing it to continue operating the facilities. She argued the arrangement treats detained immigrants as a revenue stream rather than as people.

CoreCivic said the facilities’ valuations were determined through the federally mandated appraisal process, which is designed to establish fair market value.

“CoreCivic has contributed to presidential inaugural events across multiple administrations, including Democratic ones. The federal appraisal process is conducted independently of any political contributions,” said Steven Owen, the company’s vice president of communications.

Owen added that California’s property tax system, shaped by Proposition 13, often causes assessed values to diverge significantly from market value over time, since the law limits annual increases in assessed value outside of a sale. He said the two figures “are not directly comparable.”

Securities filings show CoreCivic expects to generate roughly $130 million annually from managing the California City detention center going forward.

Will more federal purchases follow?

Trickler-McNulty said an earlier, since-abandoned plan to purchase two dozen warehouse facilities under former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem may offer clues about what current Secretary Markwayne Mullin’s agency has in mind next. An internal roadmap obtained last year by the Washington Post identified at least 10 “turnkey” facilities originally targeted for purchase under Noem, including the California City site — though not Otay Mesa. The rest of those properties are located in Texas and Oklahoma.

Buying up detention facilities outright removes financial risk for both private prison operators and the administration’s deportation program, said R. Andrew Free, an immigration attorney and writer. He pointed to the 2019 divestment from CoreCivic and GEO Group by California’s two largest public pension funds, which contributed to a liquidity crunch and a steep drop in both companies’ stock prices five years ago.

If private prison investment becomes politically untenable on a national scale, Free said, federal ownership shields the companies — and the detention system itself — from further divestment pressure and from the kind of environmental reviews that have derailed similar projects in other states.

“This is a significant amount of money the federal government is handing over up front,” Free said.

He added that local and state governments will largely be locked out of oversight at these facilities, though they will still have some contact with people held there. Detention centers “will still need police and fire services, they’ll still need coroners,” Free said, but he noted that most traditional state inspection authority has likely already ended.

Free said there are two ways to interpret the expansion of ICE’s detention footprint. One is relatively benign — simply favors from a friendly administration to valued contractors. The other is more troubling.

“The cynical view is that this will definitely be used to hold people who aren’t migrants,” Free said. “That it will be used to detain American citizens.”

Original source: CalMatters

The post What the Sale of Two ICE Detention Centers Reveals About Trump’s New Immigration Strategy appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

The Department of Homeland Security recently completed a $1.5 billion purchase of two major detention sites from private prison operator CoreCivic — the Otay Mesa Detention Center in San Diego County and the California City Detention Facility in Kern County. Federal officials say the move is a direct answer to years of political pushback from Sacramento against ICE’s presence in the state.

“Unlike in states like Florida and Oklahoma, ICE can not rely on local state and county partners for detention space in California,” said ICE spokesman Jason Sweeney, adding that state lawmakers have repeatedly tried to outlaw or financially cripple private detention operators.

The friction goes back to Trump’s first term, when Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a 2019 law intended to phase out private, for-profit detention facilities in California by 2028. GEO Group and the federal government sued, and the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the ban in 2022, ruling it interfered with federal authority. Since then, state lawmakers have tried other tactics, including proposals to tax private detention centers heavily enough to make them unprofitable.

The purchases also arrive amid an ongoing legal battle between California Attorney General Rob Bonta and the federal government over a planned ICE facility near Gilroy, on farmland south of San Jose that state law has restricted to agricultural use since 1967. Bonta argues the project violates federal environmental law, and ICE agreed in July to pause construction while the lawsuit continues. Records show the General Services Administration signed a 20-year, $26.5 million lease for that site with a Beverly Hills-based landlord in 2025.

California officials have also used state inspection authority to scrutinize detention conditions. Bonta sent DHS a letter in December citing “dangerous and inadequate” conditions at the California City facility, and San Diego County health inspectors remain locked in a legal dispute with CoreCivic over access to Otay Mesa. Claire Trickler-McNulty, a former senior ICE official under the Biden administration, said federal ownership of the properties will likely shield them from those kinds of local inspections and zoning rules altogether.

The purchases mark a striking reversal from the sweeping expansion plan the administration unveiled in early 2026, which envisioned converting warehouses into massive detention complexes capable of holding up to 10,000 people apiece — facilities larger than any built in the U.S. since Japanese internment camps during World War II. That plan, known as the ICE Detention Re-engineering Initiative, has largely stalled amid lawsuits, unworkable timelines and a nationwide shortage of correctional and health care staff, according to Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow at the American Immigration Council.

“At no point did anyone sit down to intelligently design the ‘Amazon Prime for human beings,'” Reichlin-Melnick said, referencing a comment from former acting ICE Director Todd Lyons, who once said he wanted deportations to run like an efficient shipping operation.

With billions in detention funding still needing to be spent before it expires, Reichlin-Melnick expects ICE to pursue more facility purchases like the ones in California.

The price tags on the two properties have raised eyebrows. County assessor records show Otay Mesa’s assessed value for the current tax year is $164.9 million, while the federal government paid $739.2 million — more than four times that figure. In Kern County, the California City site was assessed at $171.5 million but sold for $732.6 million.

A former senior ICE official, speaking on condition of anonymity, questioned whether the spending reflects an actual security need. “So, $1.5 billion just for the facilities and how many migrants are ever going to come in and out of there who are national security and public safety threats?” the official asked.

CoreCivic defended the pricing, saying it was determined through a federally required appraisal process meant to establish fair market value. Company spokesman Steven Owen also noted that California’s Proposition 13 limits how often commercial properties can be reassessed, meaning assessed values often lag far behind current market prices. “The two figures are not directly comparable,” Owen said.

Newsom’s office pushed back sharply. Spokesperson Anthony Martinez called the administration’s deportation strategy a “reckless and cruel misuse of taxpayer money,” accusing federal officials of funneling billions to contractors while avoiding scrutiny of detention conditions.

San Diego County Supervisor Paloma Aguirre drew a direct line between the sale and CoreCivic’s political giving, noting the company donated $500,000 to Trump’s inaugural committee. She described the resulting contract as a “billion-dollar taxpayer-funded windfall” that will help erase the company’s debt while allowing it to keep operating the facilities — treating detained immigrants, she said, as a revenue source rather than people. CoreCivic said it has donated to inaugural events under both Democratic and Republican administrations and that the appraisal process is independent of political contributions. The company expects to earn about $130 million annually running the California City facility, according to its SEC filings.

Looking ahead, Trickler-McNulty said a previously abandoned plan under former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to purchase two dozen warehouse-style facilities may offer clues to what current Secretary Markwayne Mullin’s agency will pursue next. Internal documents obtained by the Washington Post identified at least 10 “turnkey” facilities under consideration, including California City, along with sites in Texas and Oklahoma. Otay Mesa was not among them.

Immigration attorney R. Andrew Free said outright federal ownership eliminates financial risk for both the government and private prison operators, pointing to the steep stock declines CoreCivic and GEO Group suffered after California’s two largest public pension funds divested from the companies in 2019. Buying the properties outright, he said, insulates them from further divestment pressure and from the kind of environmental reviews that have derailed similar detention projects elsewhere.

“This is a big upfront cash award from the federal government,” Free said.

He added that local governments will likely lose most oversight authority over the facilities, though police, fire and coroner services will still be needed. Free said there are two ways to interpret the expansion — as a straightforward reward to a favored contractor, or as something more concerning.

“The cynical view is this definitely will be used to hold people who are not migrants,” Free said. “That it will be used to hold U.S. citizens.”

Original source: CalMatters

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GRIZZLY FLATS, Calif. (AP) — Firefighters faced dangerously windy weather Tuesday as they struggled to keep the nation’s largest wildfire from advancing toward a Northern California city while a portrait of devastation emerged in a small mountain community hit by another inferno.

Winds spawned by the arrival of a new weather system Monday afternoon pushed the monstrous Dixie Fire to within about 8 miles (12.8 kilometers) of Susanville, population about 18,000, while to the southeast a small blaze called the Caldor Fire exploded through through Grizzly Flats, a town of about 1,200.

Very few homes were left standing in Grizzly Flats, where streets were littered with downed power lines and poles. Houses were reduced to smoldering ash and twisted metal with only chimneys rising above the ruins. A post office and elementary school were also destroyed.

Two people with serious or severe injuries were airlifted to hospitals from the Grizzly Flats area, fire officials said.

At the Dixie Fire, numerous resources were put into the Susanville area, where residents were warned to be ready to evacuate, said Mark Brunton, an operations section chief.

“It’s not out of play, and the next 24 hours are going to be crucial to watch as to what the fire is going to do there,” he told an online briefing.

To the east, spot fires became established south of the small community of Janesville, which had been ordered evacuated. Some structures were lost there — images captured by The Associated Press showed a home consumed by flames — but a surge of firefighters was able to herd the fire around the majority of the town, Brunton said.

The Dixie Fire is the largest of nearly 100 major wildfires burning across more than a dozen Western states that have seen historic drought and weeks of high temperatures and dry weather that have left trees, brush and grasslands as flammable as tinder. Climate change has made the U.S. West warmer and drier in the past 30 years and will continue to make the weather more extreme and wildfires more destructive, according to scientists.

Susanville is the seat of Lassen County and the largest city that the Dixie Fire, named for the road where it started, has approached since it broke out last month. The former Sierra Nevada logging and mining town has two state prisons, a nearby federal lockup and a casino.

Ash fell from the advancing fire, and a police statement urged residents “to be alert and be ready to evacuate” if the fire threatens the city.

The weather forecast prompted Pacific Gas & Electric to warn that it might cut off power to 48,000 customers in parts of 18 California counties Tuesday evening through Wednesday to prevent new fires that could be sparked by wind damage to power lines.

The Dixie Fire has scorched more than 940 square miles (2,434 square kilometers) in the northern Sierra Nevada and southern Cascades since it ignited on July 13 and eventually merged with a smaller blaze. It’s less than a third contained.

Investigations are continuing, but PG&E has notified utility regulators that the Dixie and Fly fires may have been caused by trees falling into its power lines. The Dixie Fire began near the town of Paradise, which was devastated by a 2018 wildfire ignited by PG&E equipment during strong winds. Eighty-five people died.

Ongoing damage surveys have counted more than 1,100 buildings destroyed, including 630 homes, and more than 16,000 structures remained threatened. Numerous evacuation orders were in effect.

The Caldor Fire started Saturday in El Dorado County and remained small until winds fueled its growth to about 10 square miles (26 square kilometers).

About 2,500 people were under evacuation orders and warnings, said Chris Vestal, a fire spokesman. Only a handful of firefighters remained in the town Tuesday, extinguishing residual fires.

Authorities confirmed structures were destroyed and damaged in Grizzly Flats and two other area communities, but Vestal said he could not say how many were affected as it was not safe for inspectors.

“They’re worried about trying to put out the fire or save homes,” he said. He said one person was injured in the fire. He did not provide additional details.

Tami Christner, 36, said she and her family left their Grizzly Flats home late Monday when they got the notice to evacuate. She and her husband started packing earlier in the day and got their three children, 20 chickens, three ducks, two cats, two hamsters, a dog and a rabbit out. One cat, Minion, was lost and didn’t make it out with them, she said.

“I am not 100% sure if my house is gone, but it might be,” she said.

People throughout the region were offering assistance to evacuees, including the four-footed kind. Susan Collins of Placerville used her horse trailer to help move two horses Tuesday after offering help on an El Dorado County Facebook page.

“I know not everybody is prepared when something like this happens, and my purpose in life is to be there to help people,” she said.

Across the state line in Nevada, school administrators delayed start times in the Reno-Sparks because of a cloak of wildfire smoke from the Dixie Fire blanketing the region. Smoke plumes from the Caldor Fire were also visible from northern Nevada.

Two dozen fires were burning in Montana and nearly 50 more in Idaho, Washington and Oregon, according to the National Fire Interagency Center.

In Montana, authorities ordered evacuations on Tuesday for several remote communities in north- central Montana as strong winds propelled a large wildfire toward inhabited areas.

The mandatory evacuation covered Lodge Pole, a town of about 300 people on the Fort Belknap Indian Reservation, and the former mining town of Zortman, which has about two dozen people, KOJM reported.

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