Politics
ICE kept a California immigrant in solitary confinement for two years, study finds
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement used solitary confinement at its detention facilities more than 14,000 times between 2018 and 2023, including one California immigrant detainee who was held for 759 days, according to a report published Tuesday.
The report found that solitary placements at ICE facilities lasted on average about a month. Nearly half exceeded 15 days.
Solitary confinement is used in ICE detention facilities as a form of punishment as well as to protect certain at-risk immigrants.
Human rights groups say the practice is harmful and should be scaled back dramatically at all U.S. prisons and detention facilities. The United Nations has called solitary confinement longer than 15 consecutive days a form of torture.
ICE in recent years has come under fire from state officials and human rights groups for its reliance on the practice, and a lack of proper oversight and monitoring.
The 71-page report — one of the most expansive looks to date into ICE’s use of solitary confinement — was conducted by researchers at Physicians for Human Rights, Harvard Law School and Harvard Medical School. It was based on internal ICE records at 125 detention facilities obtained through litigation under the Freedom of Information Act.
Researchers said ICE’s use of solitary confinement and the time periods involved were both on track to grow in 2023, though its data was only collected through Sept. 13.
“The harms are just so well established — they’re incontrovertible,” said Sabrineh Ardalan, director of the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinic. “That’s why the failure to make any significant change is shocking.”
ICE spokesperson Mike Alvarez said the agency places detainees in isolation only after careful consideration of alternatives.
“Administrative segregation placements for a special vulnerability should be used only as a last resort,” Alvarez said. “Segregation is never used as a method of retaliation.”
About 700 solitary placements lasted at least 90 days, and 42 lasted more than a year, according to the report.
The longest completed instance of solitary confinement was that of a Mexican woman held at Otay Mesa Detention Center in San Diego for 759 consecutive days until Dec. 2, 2019. Her placement was coded as “detainee requested” and the reasoning was listed as “other,” though the record also showed a disciplinary infraction for fighting, said Arevik Avedian, director of empirical research services at Harvard Law School.
Two other cases were longer, but they were not included in the report because they were still ongoing at the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma, Wash., as of Sept. 13 — for 817 and 811 days, respectively.
ICE standards generally limit disciplinary isolation to 30 days per violation. But administrative segregation, regarded as non-punitive and intended for the detainee’s safety, can be indefinite.
ICE didn’t list the isolated immigrants’ mental health status in every record. But in the nearly 8,800 records that did include mental health information, about 40% documented mental health conditions.
For people identified as transgender, the average length of solitary confinement was two months, researchers said.
Alvarez said ICE doesn’t place detainees in solitary confinement solely because of mental illness unless directed or recommended to do so by medical staff. Detainees are often placed there because they request protective custody, as a result of a disciplinary hearing or to quarantine if no medical housing is available.
Detainees with mental health issues are under the care of medical professionals, he said, and are removed from solitary confinement if they determine it has resulted in a deterioration of their health and an appropriate alternative is available.
About 38,500 immigrants were being held by ICE as of Jan. 28, according to TRAC, a nonpartisan research organization at Syracuse University. Two-thirds of those detained have no criminal record and many others have only minor offenses, such as traffic violations.
ICE has said it is moving to reduce its use of solitary confinement over the past decade.
The agency issued a 2013 directive limiting its use, particularly for people with vulnerabilities, such as disabilities or mental illness.
A 2015 memo emphasized protections for transgender people, specifying that solitary confinement “should be used only as a last resort.”
A 2022 directive strengthened protections and reporting requirements for people with mental health conditions in solitary confinement.
Detainees held in solitary confinement are isolated in small cells away from the general population for up to 24 hours a day and have minimal contact with other people. Prolonged solitary confinement is known to cause adverse health effects, including risk of suicide and brain damage.
In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed a 2022 bill that would have regulated and significantly reduced solitary confinement in jails, prisons and ICE facilities.
Watchdog reports have repeatedly identified failures in ICE’s approach to and oversight of solitary confinement.
In 2021, the California Department of Justice issued a review of ICE detention in the state, with comprehensive looks at three privately operated facilities. Cal DOJ found little distinction between the conditions for detainees in administrative isolation as for those held for disciplinary reasons. The agency also found that detainees with mental illnesses were held in solitary confinement despite the isolation worsening their conditions.
“Most detainees in segregation are in their cells for 22 hours a day and when they are allowed outside they are generally recreating in individual cages,” the California report stated.
The same year, a report by the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General found that ICE failed to consistently comply with reporting requirements for solitary confinement. Investigators analyzed records from fiscal years 2015 to 2019 and found ICE hadn’t maintained evidence showing it considered alternatives to isolation in 72% of solitary confinement placements.
Citing that report, Democratic senators, including the late Dianne Feinstein and Sen. Alex Padilla of California, pressed ICE leaders about the agency’s “excessive and seemingly indiscriminate use of solitary confinement,” calling it a long-standing problem.
A 2022 report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office found that information about detainee vulnerabilities and explanations of what led to their placement in solitary confinement were inconsistent. The GAO analyzed solitary confinement placements from 2017 through 2021 and found that about 40% were for disciplinary reasons and 60% were for administrative reasons, such as protective custody.
ICE says facility staff are required to offer people in administrative segregation the same privileges as those in general housing, including recreation, visitation, access to the law library and phones. They could also spend additional time out of isolation socializing or doing voluntary work assignments such as cleaning. Privileges for those in disciplinary segregation vary based on the amount of supervision required.
But two dozen formerly detained people interviewed by the report authors described having limited or no access to phone calls, recreation, medical care and medications.
Karim Golding, 39, of Jamaica was detained by ICE from 2016 to 2021. At the Etowah County Detention Center in Alabama, which ICE stopped using in 2022 because of its “long history of serious deficiencies,” Golding said he spent nearly two months in solitary confinement after testing positive for COVID-19. He now lives in New York.
Golding said that during the height of the pandemic, as the facility allowed busloads of new detainees in without following proper distancing or isolation guidelines, he urged the staff to provide tests. He and other detainees submitted dozens of sick calls requesting tests.
When the staff finally complied, he and several others were placed in solitary after testing positive for the coronavirus. He said he believes the move was retaliatory.
Golding remembers sometimes spending 40 hours at a time in his dingy 8×10-foot cell with holes in the concrete walls and no access to a shower. The isolation was lonely, he recalled.
“I went to sleep one night and woke up suffocating in the cell,” he said. “I started to cry because there was no panic button inside these cells. There was no officer, anything for help.”
Two other detainees reached by The Times said they were held in solitary confinement at facilities in Texas and Louisiana for several days while on a hunger strike.
As a candidate, President Biden pledged to end the use of solitary confinement in federal prisons. He signed an executive order in 2022 promising to ensure incarcerated people are “free from prolonged segregation.”
Authors of Tuesday’s report called on Biden to phase out the use of solitary confinement in immigration detention.
“There is still time,” Ardalan said. “This is one legacy he could leave from his administration.”
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The attorney who helped persuade the Supreme Court to strike down Hawaii’s private-property concealed-carry restriction on Thursday criticized the state’s reliance on a Reconstruction-era Black Code to defend the law.
In a 6-3 decision in Wolford v. Lopez, the Court held that Hawaii cannot require licensed gun owners to obtain express permission before carrying firearms onto private property open to the public. Gun-rights challengers dubbed the policy the “vampire rule” because lawful gun owners had to be “invited in” before entering businesses while armed.
“It is disgraceful that any state would rely on a law specifically aimed at taking away the Second Amendment rights or any constitutional right of Black Americans as it was at that time,” attorney Kevin O’Grady, who represented the plaintiffs, told Fox News Digital.
“And it’s not surprising, however, that Hawaii would rely on it as they are diametrically opposed to the Second Amendment. We fully expected that the Supreme Court would identify that as the kind of law that one absolutely should not look to determine whether or not something is constitutional because this is the perfect example of something which is not constitutional.”
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Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson speaks on stage during the “Ketanji Brown Jackson on Lovely One: A Memoir” panel at The Atlantic Festival in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 20, 2024. (Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images for The Atlantic)
A major flashpoint was Hawaii’s effort to justify the law under the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen. Since Bruen, courts evaluating firearm regulations have generally asked whether modern gun restrictions are consistent with the nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.
Hawaii cited several historical laws, including an 1865 Louisiana statute enacted as part of the post-Civil War Black Codes. The law made it unlawful to carry firearms onto another person’s property without the owner’s consent.
Justice Samuel Alito, writing for the majority, rejected that argument outright, calling the Louisiana statute a “tainted artifact” that was enacted to disarm newly freed Black Americans and leave them defenseless after the Civil War. He concluded the law “cannot be taken seriously” as evidence of the Second Amendment’s original public meaning.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, however, argued in her dissent the Court skipped an important constitutional question.
Jackson did not defend the Black Codes, which she acknowledged were racist and used to oppress newly freed Black Americans. But she argued the Court should have first decided whether the Louisiana law itself violated the Second Amendment, or whether the real constitutional problem was that it was enforced in a racially discriminatory way.
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Todd Settergren handles pistols inside his display case at Setterarms gun shop in Walnut Creek, Calif., on Jan. 13, 2017. (Michael Macor/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)
“It might well be that the Black Codes are invalid inputs for Bruen’s test,” Jackson wrote, “but only if they violated the Second Amendment — which may or may not be the case.”
Instead, she argued that under the Supreme Court’s Bruen framework, the Court could not simply dismiss those laws without first explaining why they should not count as historical evidence.
She outlined two possibilities: either the firearm restrictions in the Black Codes were constitutional but enforced in a racially discriminatory manner — making the constitutional defect an equal-protection problem — or the restrictions independently violated the Second Amendment. The Court, she argued, never resolved that question before excluding the Louisiana law from consideration.
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“Either history does matter, and if so, all potentially relevant historical experiences must be thoroughly examined,” she wrote. “Or, it does not, and the Court should just admit that the test it has created is boundless.”
Her reasoning immediately drew pushback from critics, who argued the Fourteenth Amendment was passed in response to laws like the Black Codes that denied newly freed Black Americans their constitutional rights, like the right to bear arms.
Rain clouds roll over the United States Supreme Court building in Washington, D.C., on June 18, 2026. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
“I would simply point her to what Justice Alito pointed out in the majority ruling — it was in response to these types of laws that the Fourteenth Amendment was enacted in the first place,” Hannah Hill, vice president of the National Association of Gun Rights, told Fox News Digital.
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“That right there is your answer,” Hill continued. “Yes, there was a historical tradition — they enacted a constitutional amendment to fix that deprivation of rights, and that is also in the Constitution now, so I think she should probably go back to law school.”
Tyler Yzaguirre, president of Second Amendment Institute, echoed O’Grady and Hill’s criticism.
“Those laws were not legitimate expressions of our Nation’s constitutional tradition; they were examples of government using its power to deprive Americans of a fundamental right,” Yzaguirre told Fox News Digital. “The Court was right to reject the notion that such laws could define the historical limits of the Second Amendment.”
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Businesses may still ban guns by posting or enforcing a “no firearms” policy. But what Hawaii can’t do, the Court said, is treat every business as off-limits to licensed gun owners unless the owner specifically says guns are allowed.
SACRAMENTO — Gov. Gavin Newsom reached an agreement Friday with legislative leaders on a $351.7-billion state budget in his final year as governor, a spending plan that uses a tax windfall to avoid major cuts and lessen California’s chronic deficit in the years ahead.
The deal provides nearly $2 billion in state revenue next year through tax hikes on corporations, new levies on software sales and a revamped tax on managed healthcare organizations. Lawmakers and the governor continue major investments in public schools, healthcare and agreed to increase spending on subsidized childcare and affordable housing.
“We want to leave the next governor not only a balanced budget, but a budget that is substantially structurally sound, and we’re going to accomplish that,” Newsom said in an interview Friday. “We were very cautious in terms of new spending,”
The agreement ends weeks of lobbying by outside interests and negotiations among lawmakers and the governor at the state Capitol about how to handle a surge of income tax collected on stock market gains related to artificial intelligence.
Early forecasts last June projected a $12.6-billion deficit in 2026-27, according to the California Department of Finance. Updated predictions now suggest the state will end the year with a surplus of $4.5 billion.
Democrats, following Newsom’s lead, are tucking away $6.4 billion for future years, which allows the governor to knock down a deficit previously projected through 2027-28 and assuage criticism about his spending habits.
But economists say the fix and revenue increase are likely only temporary.
Spending in California has generally exceeded revenue growth during Newsom’s tenure in the governor’s office, creating a chronic shortfall. Despite the extra funding, the budget continues a trend of relying on reserves, shifting funds, borrowing and suspending debt payments to balance state spending.
The Legislative Analyst’s Office, the nonpartisan fiscal advisor for lawmakers, has warned of a roughly $10-billion annual gap between the amount of money the state brings in and spends, which could grow dramatically worse if the stock market turns downward. The LAO has said the existence of any operating deficit during a revenue boom is a red flag and that the state is “ill-prepared” for even a modest decline.
Christopher Thornberg, an economist and founder of the consulting firm Beacon Economics, said it’s business as usual in Sacramento.
“They love increasing spending. But it seems politically impossible to go the other way,” Thornberg said. “We’ve seen this play out over and over again.”
Lawmakers and the governor offered a different take and asserted that their decision to put the $6.4 billion into a short-term reserve, called the Projected Surplus Temporary Holding Account, and ask voters to allow them to store more money in the rainy day fund are examples of prudent budgeting.
“You see us save more and you see us try to address the immediate needs of our community, but also the structural budget that potentially awaits us,” said Senate President Pro Tem Monique Limón (D-Goleta) in an interview. “We are forecasting a moment where we will need to address these issues and we want to start now to think about the future as well.”
Under a progressive tax structure, the state budget is dependent on income taxes paid by the ultra-rich on earnings largely from capital gains. The set up leaves California vulnerable to the unpredictable nature of the stock market, dramatic swings in revenue and, in recent years, reliant on poor projections.
Negotiations at the state Capitol included an agreement on a constitutional amendment that seeks to offset the revenue highs and lows.
If approved by voters on the statewide ballot in November, the amendment would raise a cap on mandatory deposits into the rainy day fund from 10% to 20% of general fund revenue. The measure would also allow lawmakers to exempt money they put into the rainy day fund and the temporary holding account from state spending limits.
Under an existing state appropriations restraint, also known as the Gann Limit, lawmakers cannot spend more than an amount determined by a formula that takes annual tax proceeds, changes to the population and cost of living into consideration. Tax revenue above the limit must be divided between schools and refunds to taxpayers.
With few exceptions, the limit applies to most appropriations of tax revenue, including when lawmakers put money away in the rainy day fund and other reserves.
Newsom said the change will leave the state in a much better position to weather the volatility. Though calls for tax reform remain in California, the governor said being able to place more money into the reserves could ultimately solve the state’s budget challenges.
“The one thing missing is the one thing that I think we finally landed, which is the change in the reserves,” Newsom said. “It changes the political dynamic, where now you’re not exchanging general fund priorities.”
Republicans criticized the proposed constitutional amendment, which passed in a budget trailer bill this week, for failing to require that excess revenue pays down the state’s $22 billion in unemployment insurance debt.
State Sen. Tony Strickland (R-Huntington Beach) called it a missed opportunity.
“It does not require debt payment to go to the UI debt,” Strickland said. “It facilitates more spending, exempting reserve deposits from the state spending limit.”
The proposed change to the state Constitution also jabs the president and asks voters to approve a 100% tax on payments any California taxpayers receive from the “Anti-Weaponization Fund” Trump established for allies who claim they were unjustly targeted by the federal government.
As part of the overall budget negotiations, lawmakers agreed to delay some healthcare cuts that would have required monthly premiums for immigrants and eliminated dental care. The deal adopts a Medi-Cal asset test of $21,000 on July 1, 2027, instead of $2,000.
The budget agreement includes a provision requiring California’s next governor to develop options to reduce taxpayer subsidies for corporations whose employees receive state-sponsored healthcare through Medi-Cal instead of the company’s health plan. The plan is aimed at raising revenue to offset federal cuts that are expected to leave millions of Californians without access to healthcare.
To generate $11.25 billion for affordable housing, Democrats approved a bond for the November ballot that would include down payment and mortgage assistance to veterans and low-income families. Democrats also approved $900 million in Homeless Housing, Assistance, and Prevention grants, marking a $400-million increase from Newsom’s budget proposal in May.
The California Department of Finance said state reserves are expected to total $28.8 billion under the 2026-27 budget.
Politics
Warren tells Trump to ‘sign the damn bill’ as bipartisan housing package remains stalled in Washington
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Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., lashed out at President Donald Trump during a recent local television interview, labeling him a “man-child” throwing a “tantrum” over his refusal to sign a sweeping bipartisan housing package.
Appearing on WCVB’s “On the Record,” the left-wing senator did not hold back her frustration over the stalled legislation, delivering a blunt message to the president: “Sign the damn bill.”
“If he cared about the American people, he’d have already signed the damn thing,” Warren said during the interview, arguing that Trump “does not care about the economic survival of America’s working families.”
FILE – The Senate previously advanced the massive housing package geared toward lowering the costs of homes and supercharging the housing supply. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., pitched it as legislation to prevent America from becoming a “nation of renters.” (Jemal Countess/Getty Images for Protect Borrowers ; Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
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The 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act is an expansive bipartisan package that she said contains nearly 50 provisions designed to address the nationwide housing emergency.
Warren noted that decades of under-building have driven prices up, leaving the U.S. in need of millions of new units.
The primary focus of the bill is to lower the costs of construction and make it easier to build new homes.
FILE – President Donald Trump previously said lawmakers must first approve the SAVE America Act before he moves forward with the housing package. (Yuri Gripas/Abaca/Bloomberg)
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The bill, which was co-sponsored by Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., also includes a secondary focus aimed at blocking corporate consolidation of the housing market.
Warren explained that the legislation is designed to keep private equity firms from buying up local neighborhoods and turning America “into a nation of renters.”
According to Warren, the legislation had widespread support from both sides of the aisle before it was stalled.
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She claimed the bill was “handed to the president on a silver platter” and that lawmakers from both parties were eagerly taking credit for the legislation.
“Republicans were all going online, saying, ‘well, I helped write that bill. This bill is terrific,’” Warren said. “So everybody’s out there saying, ‘my bill, I helped make this happen,’ right up until the man-child has a tantrum and announces he will not be signing it.”
FILE – Sen. Elizabeth Warren called President Donald Trump a “man-child” during the interview, describing his refusal to sign the bill as a “tantrum.” (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
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Critics of the legislation claim it does not allocate fresh federal funding, directly address rising costs of homeownership, or go far enough to address permitting issues.
The president previously canceled a scheduled signing event, insisting lawmakers must first approve the unrelated SAVE America Act, a voting-focused measure, before he moves forward.
The White House did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
Fox News Digital’s Alex Miller contributed to this report.
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