For the last several years, immigration advocates have pushed to stop California prisons from turning over noncitizens who’ve finished their sentences to federal authorities, a practice that disproportionately affects Latinos and Southeast Asians.
But soon after their movement notched a victory earlier this month, it suffered a big setback.
On Friday night, Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed a bill to stop some of these prison-to-ICE transfers to the surprise and anger of activists like Ny Nourn of the Asian Prisoner Support Committee.
The bill, called the HOME Act by supporters, would have protected paroled people who met certain conditions like being severely ill, having been the victim of sexual violence or having been pardoned by the governor.
For Newsom, “to say he’s a governor who's for immigrants, that has granted clemency for people that are facing detention and deportation, I think it's really hypocritical of him to veto the bill,” Nourn said.
The bill’s supporters, including sponsor Assemblymember Wendy Carrillo, are now considering pushing for an override of Newsom’s veto.
Carrillo, a Democrat from L.A., says she’s also ready to introduce the bill in its current form in the coming months for the 2024-25 legislative cycle.
The bill is scaled down from two earlier versions that failed to pass the Legislature because they lacked enough support from moderate Democrats. Carrillo pared down the bill to exclude county jails and create specific categories under which people could be protected from transfers. An estimated 70 to 100 people were expected to benefit yearly.
“We've worked really hard to get something to the governor's desk to get him to sign something that at the very minimum begins to end the dual system of justice in California that clearly is discriminatory towards immigrants,” Carrillo said.
Carrillo noted that Newsom, who is seen as a potential presidential candidate, has been trying to differentiate himself from another White House hopeful, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, whom the California governor will debate in November.
“Well, this was a huge priority to the immigrant community,” Carrillo said.
The bill would prevent information sharing and coordination upon a person's release from CDCR custody for a significant number of people and, as a result, would impede CDCR's interaction with a federal law enforcement agency charged with assessing public safety risks.
— Gov. Gavin Newsom
In his veto message, Newsom said the bill would negatively affect the working relationship between the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.
Asked for comment about plans to save the bill, the governor’s office said it had nothing to share beyond his veto message.
As for whether legislative leadership would consider overriding Newsom’s veto of the bill, neither California Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins nor Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas were available for comment, according to their spokespeople. The last time a California governor’s veto was overturned was in 1980.
