LOS ANGELES, CA — As ICE (immigration and Customs Enforcement) raids intensify across California, advocates are calling on Governor Gavin Newsom to permanently close the state’s deactivated prisons before they can be repurposed by the federal government as immigration detention centers, according to reporting by the Sacramento Press.
Since 2021, Governor Newsom has shuttered three state prisons, including the privately operated California City Correctional Facility, a move projected to save the state nearly $900 million annually. However, the state’s decision to maintain these facilities in “warm shutdown” status—keeping them staffed and secured despite being empty—has cost California approximately $300 million, the Sacramento Press reported.
The Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement agenda has fueled a surge in ICE operations, including workplace raids like the one recently conducted in Los Angeles’s garment district. ICE is actively scouting facilities for potential conversion into detention centers and has already toured FCI Dublin—a former women’s prison closed after widespread sexual abuse scandals—for possible use, the Sacramento Press noted.
Documents obtained by the ACLU and cited by the Sacramento Press reveal that private prison corporation GEO Group proposed converting the California City Correctional Facility into an immigration detention center in late 2024. Any state facility not fully decommissioned remains vulnerable to such proposals.
“ICE is looking for cages, and California’s shuttered prisons are ideal targets unless Governor Newsom takes immediate action to close them for good,” said Brian Kaneda, Deputy Director of Californians United for a Responsible Budget (CURB), a statewide coalition of over 100 organizations.
While Governor Newsom has pushed back against the federal administration through lawsuits and legal maneuvers, CURB is urging more decisive action: the full, permanent closure of prisons currently in “warm shutdown” status.
“Warm shutdowns have never been neutral; they are expensive liabilities that enable federal detention expansion,” said Dax Proctor, CURB’s statewide coordinator. “California must protect its progress on decarceration from being undone to expand ICE’s violence. Refusing to allow the federal government to build or take over deactivated state prisons is one of the clearest ways California can resist this federal administration,” Proctor told the Sacramento Press.
CURB is calling on Governor Newsom and the Legislature to take immediate steps. These include fully decommissioning all warm shutdown facilities by ending CDCR funding and removing them from operational planning, blocking their use by ICE or other carceral agencies through statutory protections and budgetary controls, and preventing GEO Group and ICE from reactivating sites like FCI Dublin and the California City Correctional Facility. They also urge lawmakers to include at least two additional prison closures in the final enacted budget and redirect the savings into housing, healthcare, reentry, and migrant justice. Finally, CURB supports community-led reuse plans to repurpose closed facilities as public-serving resources rather than punitive infrastructure.
According to the Sacramento Press, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation could eliminate at least 10,000 empty prison beds, giving the agency flexibility to manage population fluctuations resulting from Proposition 39 and enabling the closure of more prisons. The state’s nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office estimates that shutting down five additional prisons could save California up to $1.5 billion annually. In contrast, maintaining empty facilities in warm shutdown continues to drain public funds while introducing new risks—from ICE expansion to fire and climate hazards.
“In a moment of deep fiscal strain and moral turmoil, every dollar spent on wasteful prison infrastructure is a dollar that should be spent on shielding our most vulnerable communities,” said Tannah Opplinger, assistant coordinator with CURB.
“Governor Newsom has shown bold leadership,” Kaneda added. “This is another defining moment. Close the doors. Keep ICE out. Protect California’s future.”
