California state Sen. Sasha Renee Perez (D-Pasadena) announced Friday new legislation that will institute fines and suspend or revoke licenses to immigration detention facilities when they fail to meet minimum health and safety standards.
The proposed law — SB 995 — aims to help state authorities ensure that private detention centers comply with state health and safety standards through inspections.
The detention center operators would be required to correct any deficiencies identified by inspectors or face a civil penalty up to $25,000 a day for each violation. Operators could also risk having their state-issued licenses suspended or revoked.
“Private detention centers have earned millions in profits and continued to secure contracts with government agencies, despite well documented cases of health and safety violations,” Perez said in a written statement. “It is time for the State of California to use its legal and moral authority to inspect private detention facilities, hold bad actors accountable and close facilities with consistent, documented cases of human rights abuses.”
In a report released last year, California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta reviewed six private immigration detention facilities in the state and found serious deficiencies, including inadequate medical and mental health care, inadequate suicide prevention protocols, a lack of transparency regarding use-of-force practices, and due process rights violations including access to legal counsel.
Perez and immigrant rights groups say these issues have persisted, if not worsened, despite federal inspections conducted under Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s standards.
There are at least six immigration detention facilities in California, some of which were closed but reopened to meet a surge in immigration detainees as President Trump carried out mass deportations.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security could not immediately be reached for comment.
There are currently 68,289 immigrants in detention centers across the U.S. with at least 74% of detainees having no criminal convictions, according to TRAC, a data research organization.
Many of those with convictions are for minor offenses, including traffic violations.
Earlier this year, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said about 70% of people whom the agency has arrested have been convicted or charged with a crime in the United States.
In the first nine months of the administration’s immigration crackdown, from Jan. 1 to Oct. 15, a Times analysis of nationwide ICE arrests found that percentage to be about the same.
In Los Angeles, the same analyses found that of the more than 10,000 Los Angeles residents who were arrested in immigration operations, about 45% were charged with a criminal conviction and an additional 14% had pending charges.
Friday’s announcement comes as the Trump administration looks to increase the number of detention centers across the country.
But looming over the administration is the growing number of immigrants who have died while in the custody of federal immigration authorities.
Last year, 33 people died while in the custody of ICE, according to detainee death reports published by the Department of Homeland Security. Some deaths have occurred at facilities in California.
SB 995 is named after Masuma Khan, an immigrant from Bangladesh and Eaton fire survivor who was detained in October 2025 at the California City Detention Facility, a former prison in the Mojave Desert, some 67 miles east of Bakersfield.
The facility was the subject of a federal class-action lawsuit filed by seven immigrants who alleged inhumane conditions and mistreatment.
Last month, a federal Judge ruled on the case, ordering ICE and Homeland Security to provide “constitutionally adequate healthcare” to people detained at the facility. She also required an external monitor to ensure compliance.
Ryan Gustin, a spokesman for CoreCivic, which operates the facility, told The Times that they “work closely with our government partner to ensure we are providing all required services and meeting applicable standards.”
Khan said she was kept in frigid conditions, often without warm clothes, appropriate food or access to vital medicine. In November, a federal judge ordered Khan be released and blocked her detention until the court could consider the government’s argument on why it needed to detain her.
“Masuma Khan represents just one of the many people with no criminal history, who is responsibly showing up to her government appointments, and has still been targeted by the Trump Administration,” Perez said in her statement.
“No one in California should lose their dignity, their well-being, or their life because a facility failed to meet basic health and safety standards,” said Hector O. Villagra of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund (MALDEF), who is co-sponsoring the bill. “California has both the right and the responsibility to ensure that every involuntary residential facility meets fundamental standards of safety, sanitation, and humane treatment.”
Angelica Salas, executive director of the coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights (CHIRLA) and who is also co-sponsoring the bill, said the state must employ its policing powers to ensure residents in detention centers have access to basic necessities, care and safety.
“It is unconscionable to continue to operate these facilities without oversight given the unprecedented numbers of individuals detained in our state,” she said
Perez said the bill, dubbed the Masuma Khan Justice Act, will begin the legislative process in the coming weeks.