California Fails to Honor ICE Detainers for Thousands of Detainees

Records from Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE) indicate that California did not comply with detainers for over 13,000 individuals. An ICE detainer is a request for local or state law enforcement to hold individuals for up to 48 hours after their scheduled release so that ICE can take custody for deportation purposes.

Apparently, ICE often uses this detainer as a means to arrest those who are subject to deportation. According to the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), there are specific sanctuary jurisdictions where ICE frequently encounters issues obtaining custody of foreign nationals incarcerated there. Between October 1, 2022, and February 6, 2025, these facilities denied custody to more than 25,000 detainees, failing to give ICE appropriate notice for custody in over 1,400 cases.

The data suggests that about 52% of the detainees denied custody were from California prisons. In total, California could not honor 13,025 detainers, while other states like Illinois, Virginia, Massachusetts, and Connecticut also saw significant numbers of detainees being denied.

CIS noted that the Santa Clara County main jail had one of the highest numbers of releases, letting go nearly 3,000 criminal aliens during the cited period. Alarmingly, a total of 72 individuals let go had been convicted or charged with murder. Specifically, both the Illinois River Correctional Center and Santa Clara County Jail released six convicted murderers each, and the Stateville Correctional Center in Illinois allowed five to go.