Local Policing and ICE Cooperation

Residents in Escondido, California are pressing city leaders to cancel a contract that lets Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents train at the city’s police firing range, turning a little‑known arrangement into a local flashpoint amid President Trump’s immigration crackdown. The city signed a formal agreement with ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations unit in 2024, renewed this year, that pays Escondido $22,500 annually for up to three years to let agents use the outdoor range—one of 22 agencies that train there—without joint exercises with local police. After activists found the contract online, weeks of demonstrations have erupted in the 150,000‑person city, where Latinos are roughly half the population and opponents say the deal will scare immigrants away from reporting crimes and symbolically align local police with a federal agency they view as lawless. The City Council is scheduled to publicly debate the contract Wednesday, as similar fights over ICE training space, parking and large detention warehouses play out in other communities and Democrats in Washington hold up new DHS funding until limits are imposed on federal immigration operations following the fatal ICE shootings of Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minneapolis. The Escondido Police Department says it merely rents space and does not train with ICE, but many residents say they "don’t want ICE anywhere near Escondido" or "fraternizing with the police," underscoring how even small-dollar service contracts are now swept into the national war over immigration enforcement.