In recent months, federal agents have camped out in the lobby of a Southern California hospital, guarded detained patients — sometimes shackled — in hospital rooms, and chased an immigrant landscaper into a surgical center.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have also shown up at community clinics. Health providers say that officers have tried to enter a parking lot hosting a mobile clinic, waved a machine gun in the faces of clinicians serving the homeless, and hauled a passerby into an unmarked car outside a community health center.
In response to such immigration enforcement activity in and around clinics and hospitals, Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom last month signed SB 81, which prohibits medical establishments from allowing federal agents without a valid search warrant or court order into private areas, including places where patients receive treatment or discuss health matters.
But while the bill received broad support from medical groups, health care workers, and immigrant rights advocates, legal experts say California can’t stop federal authorities from carrying out duties in public places, which include hospital lobbies and general waiting areas, health facility parking lots, and surrounding neighborhoods — places where recent ICE activities have sparked outrage and fear. Previous federal restrictions on immigration enforcement in or near sensitive areas, including health care establishments, were rescinded by the Trump administration in January.
“The issue that states encounter is the supremacy clause,” said Sophia Genovese, a supervising attorney and clinical teaching fellow at Georgetown Law. She said the federal government does have the right to conduct enforcement activities, and there are limits to what the state can do to stop them.
California’s law designates a patient’s immigration status and birthplace as protected information, which like medical records cannot be disclosed to law enforcement without a warrant or court order. And it requires health care facilities to have clear procedures for handling …