Newsom Mobilizes State and Philanthropy to Defend Families Facing Federal Assault

SACRAMENTO — As the Trump administration escalates mass detention and deportation efforts across the country, California Feb. 20 announced a collaboration with philanthropic leaders to expand legal assistance, help families meet basic needs and connect with help during a time of escalating fear and instability.

The state has heard directly from immigrant families and community leaders about their struggles. People are afraid to leave their homes, children are left without their parents, and families unable to afford groceries. Families are foregoing critical medical care. There are reports of people being deported before they can speak to an attorney or be located by their family, as the administration expands long-term detention of families and longstanding residents who have no criminal history.

California is leveraging up to $35 million in existing humanitarian funding and working alongside philanthropic partners to help connect families to legal support, food assistance, and other essential resources. While the state’s investment will not provide cash payments, the investment will allow nonprofits to provide in-kind support for basic needs. The investment builds upon the state’s commitment, alongside legislative leadership, to protect immigrant families and represents the latest coordinated effort with philanthropic partners to meet the most urgent and emerging needs. California is home to many immigrant families, including American families with mixed-immigration status. They contribute to our neighborhoods, create jobs and support our economy. Supporting them in this moment strengthens neighborhoods and local economies.

Through California’s continued partnership with philanthropic organizations, the state is maximizing available funding and community support to assist families with basic needs and services that support their well-being. The state’s collaboration with the California Community Foundation, the San Francisco Foundation, and the Sierra Health Foundation recent aligned and complementary investments total nearly $30 million. 

This investment builds on California’s broader approach to support families, and includes legal services, community outreach, and regional coordination, to strengthen the local response to the challenges facing immigrant families. These efforts are increasing expertise in the legal representation of habeas matters to help release Californians from unlawful immigration detention, strengthening responses to immigration enforcement, and bolstering collaboration between local agencies and the communities receiving services.

Regional partnerships

Through regional networks of immigrant-serving organizations, the state is funding nonprofits to coordinate legal interventions for detained individuals, enhance regional collaboration and responses to harms caused by immigration enforcement, and connect families to trusted services.

This effort has already helped thousands of Californians with access to legal and social services, including through outreach events in various languages, legal consultations, and detention center visits.

This regional coordination also leverages other state funding for immigration services, including facilitating connections to removal defense attorneys through the Detained Representation Project for people who are detained and facing immigration proceedings, a service supported by the Governor and Legislature’s allocation of funding from the 2025 Special Sessions. 

California remains vigilant

The state announced a new online portal to assist members of the public in reporting potentially unlawful activity by federal agents and officers across the state. The portal allows Californians to submit video and photos, helping create a record of potential unlawful conduct by federal agents and informing possible legal actions the state may take to protect Californians’ rights. If you believe you are witnessing a crime in progress, you should call 911 or your local law enforcement agency and report it.

California has taken action, including enacting recent legislation to help keep people safe and push back against the administraton’s “secret police” tactics in California.

• Schools: Families will be notified when immigration enforcement comes on school campuses, and student information and classrooms are protected from ICE — and require a judicial warrant or court order to be accessed.
• Hospitals: Emergency rooms and other nonpublic areas in a public hospital are off limits to immigration enforcement without a judicial warrant or court order, and immigration information collected by a health care provider is protected as medical information.
• Parent’s Rights and Due process: Laws that support parental rights in the face of increasing family separations due to immigration enforcement. Funding immigration attorneys and assistance for immigrants so they can keep or apply for legal status, and have their day in court to prevent their wrongful detention and deportation.