Justice Department requests lists of all noncitizen inmates being held in California jails
The United States Ministry of Justice asked California on Thursday to provide him with lists of all prisoners in their prisons who are not American citizens, as well as the crimes of which they have been accused or condemned and their planned release dates.
The Ministry of Justice said in a statement that its “data requests” to the counties – including the counties of Los Angeles and San Francisco – were “designed to help the federal immigration authorities to prioritize the abolition of illegal foreigners who have committed crimes after having illegally penetrated in the United States”.
The requests add another layer to the war of the already swirling lawn of the Trump administration with California on the immigration policy and the national and local laws of the sanctuary. US immigration and customs agents invaded the region, which made thousands of arrests as part of President Trump’s appeal to mass deportations, and the Ministry of Justice is already pursuing the city of Los Angeles for its sanctuary policy.
State representatives have long defended the policies of the sanctuary of California, who generally prohibit local authorities to enforce civil immigration laws but provide exceptions in cases involving criminal offenses. They also criticized the administration and ice agents for their recent arrest tactics in Southern California, including citing personalities who show that a majority of arrested people have had no criminal conviction.
What immediate impact the requests would have – and if they would have launched a legal challenge from the state or counties – was not immediately clear. California Atty. General Rob Bonta’s office did not immediately respond to a comment request.
The Sheriff’s Department of the County of Los Angeles recently resumed the transfer of prison prisoners to the ice for the first time in years, citing criminal exceptions to the national and local laws of the sanctuary.
A spokesperson for the county of the question on the request to the Sheriff department.
Asked about the request at a meeting of the Civil Supervisory Committee Thursday morning, the Sheriff of the County of Robert Luna said that information on all the county prisoners is already accessible to the public on the website of the department.
“At the minute you are reserved, treated and you are in life, it is a national system, so agents of the federal government will know that you are in detention,” he said. “It is therefore not that we inform them, it is an automatic notification based on your fingerprints.”
The Ministry of Justice said he hoped that the counties would voluntarily comply with his requests. But if they do not do so, he said, he “would continue all the available means to obtain the data, including through Assignas or another compulsory process”.
He said that even if “each illegal foreigner violently violates federal law, those who continue to commit crimes after having done this show that they present an increased risk for our nation’s security and security”.
Not all non-citizens in the United States are not illegally in the country, since there are permanent non-citizen residents and other visa holders. However, as part of its immigration repression, the Trump administration was also excessive to people in these categories.
Atty. General Pam Bondi, in his own declaration on requests, said that the abolition of the country’s “illegal extraterrestrials” of the country was the “highest priority” in the administration.
“I can’t wait to cooperate with California’s county sheriffs to accomplish our common duty to keep the Californians and all the Americans safe,” said Bondi.
In May, the Department of Luna transferred the prisoners of its ice prison for the first time since the beginning of 2020. Between May and June, the department gave 20 prisoners to the Federal Agency.
During Thursday’s surveillance meeting, Luna said the department had received 995 Civil Ice Detention requests in 2024, and that it did not correspond to any of them, which is legally forced to do. But he said that the ministry was to present the 20 detainees because he had received federal judicial mandates from the federal authorities for each of them.
He said he expected these mandates to increase, which would increase the number of detainees returned.
“These are legal documents signed by a judge. We cannot refuse them,” he said.
Max Huntsman, the County Inspector General and other experts said that the Sheriff department was required by federal and state law to comply with the mandates, and that the process is legal under the policies of the national and local sanctuary.
The staff editors Rebecca Ellis and Rachel Uranga contributed to this report.
