A Southern California county will stop letting federal immigration authorities train at a local firing range over concerns about the Trump administration’s on immigrants.
San Diego County supervisors voted 3-2 on Tuesday to end contracts with Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection to train at a county-owned facility near the Mexican border and a Navy facility leased by the county. The agencies that conduct immigration enforcement and run customs and immigration checks on the busy U.S.-Mexico border have had contracts for years to train at the facilities.
鈥淔ederal immigration agents have harmed our communities many different ways here locally and throughout the nation,鈥� said Monica Montgomery Steppe, one of the supervisors who voted to end the contracts. 鈥淲e just don鈥檛 want to be complicit in that.鈥�
Kelly Martinez, San Diego County’s elected sheriff, said after the vote that she told ICE it no longer has access to county facilities, saying she arrived at the decision 鈥渁fter months of conversations and hearing community concerns surrounding the actions of ICE agents during armed confrontations in other parts of the country.鈥�
But Martinez said CBP could continue using a county facility, setting up a showdown with the supervisors, who are also elected. The sheriff made a lengthy defense of CBP’s work combating border crime and facilitating trade and travel.
鈥淭oo many people on both sides of the border would be harmed by a decision to end CBP鈥檚 use of the facility,鈥� Martinez said. 鈥淎s Sheriff, I have a duty to protect and serve everyone who lives in or enters San Diego County.鈥�
The supervisors’ vote came after residents clamored for the county of more than 3 million people on the U.S.-Mexico border to end the contracts. They said it would be a way to stop helping the Trump administration鈥檚 mass deportation campaign that has split up families and led to between federal agents and residents in communities from Minnesota to Maine.
Other communities including the nearby city of Escondido and others in New York and Minnesota also have debated whether to let immigration agents use their firing ranges, but .
Jim Desmond, a San Diego County supervisor who voted against the move, said law enforcement agencies should be working and training together and making agents travel farther to get training doesn鈥檛 accomplish anything.
鈥淚CE has overreached and overstepped, but how do you fix that? You fix it with more training,鈥� he said.
Rodney Scott, who heads Customs and Border Protection, said the agency relies on the county鈥檚 firing range to train 1,700 officers. Without it, he said, he鈥檇 send them elsewhere for mandatory firearms training, which will reduce local staffing and affect trade and travel across the U.S.-Mexico border.
鈥淚t is unprecedented for a local partner, such as the San Diego County Board of Supervisors, to knowingly undermine border security and put our communities at risk,鈥� Scott said in a statement.
ICE did not return requests for comment.
In San Diego, CBP has had an agreement to use the county鈥檚 training center since 2017 and ICE has had one since 2021. Federal agents have logged more than 3,300 training hours at the center since 2024, according to a letter from supervisors who proposed ending the contracts.
ICE also has had an agreement since 2022 to use a Navy-owned firing range that the county leases on Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, the letter said.
San Diego officials who voted to end the contracts said they want to keep the trust of the region’s immigrant communities and have worked hard to distinguish local police from federal immigration agents. Advocates said the Trump administration has tasked other federal agencies to help carry out immigration enforcement and with authorities wearing masks and street clothing, it is challenging to know which agency they work for.
鈥淥ur community is a home, not a target,鈥� Terra Lawson-Remer, the board’s chair, said this week. She was one of two supervisors who proposed ending the contracts. 鈥淚f the Trump administration wants to spend billions on this law and deportation agenda, they can use their own federal resources to carry it out.鈥�
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