SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Sen. Steve Padilla, D-San Diego, introduced Senate Bill 941 on Jan. 29, 2026, proposing to curb excessive markups on basic goods sold inside California’s private detention facilities amid growing scrutiny of detention conditions and corporate profiteering.
The bill would prohibit excessive markups on products sold at private detention facilities.
California has seven privately operated detention facilities under contract with the federal government, where more than 90% of individuals detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement are held.
According to reports from oversight and advocacy organizations, third-party vendors in these facilities sell basic necessities at prices that lack meaningful oversight.
Disability Rights California reported that during a monitoring visit to the California City Detention Facility, drinking water provided to detained individuals was “brown in color and unpleasant in taste,” conditions the organization found “[required] detainees to purchase bottled water from the commissary.”
In a separate report, UCLA interviewed individuals who were previously or are currently detained and “found that commissary costs in private detention facilities were significantly higher than in state prisons.”
Reuters, the multimedia news provider, has reported that facilities owned by Boca Raton, Florida-based Geo Group Inc., the nation’s largest for-profit corrections company, deliberately skimp on essentials, including food, to coerce detainees to labor for pennies an hour to supplement meager rations.
Padilla said, “California corporations are taking advantage of President Trump’s mass incarceration spree and profiting off the heinous conditions detainees, which include U.S. citizens, have to endure.” He added that “[t]his kind of opportunistic profiteering cannot be allowed to continue unchecked.”
California enacted Senate Bill 474, known as the BASIC Act, in 2023, which “limits commissary price markups in state prisons to no more than 35% above cost.” However, the law does not apply to private corporations, allowing individuals in those facilities to be exploited through excessive pricing.
The bill Padilla introduced, SB 941, sponsored by Immigrant Defense Advocates, would “extend California’s existing commissary price protections to private detention facilities by prohibiting the sale of commissary items at prices exceeding a 35% markup above vendor cost.”
Jackie Gonzalez, co-executive director of Immigrant Defense Advocates, said, “California must continue to lead the way in ending these predatory practices and ensuring that everyone in our state is protected from this type of exploitation.” She added that “SB 941 does exactly that.”
Sen. Anna Caballero, D-Merced, and Padilla introduced SB 941 as part of a legislative package that “[addresses] rampant profiteering and abuse in private detention facilities in California.”
The package also includes SB 942, which would require private detention facilities to obtain a state license through the California Department of Public Health as a condition of operating in the state.
Caballero said her bill, SB 942, “[ensures] the health and safety of detainees.”
SB 941 is expected to be heard in the Senate in the coming months.
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